Bryson Williams and Kevin Obanor made quite the first impression in front of a packed house at the United Supermarkets Arena on Tuesday night, as Texas Tech would defeat North Florida 89-74. Williams led the Red Raiders on the offensive end with 22 points on 9 of 11 shooting, grabbing 7 rebounds, and adding a steal and a block on the defensive end. Obanor added 17 points and 6 boards while hitting 3 of 5 three-point attempts. Both players talked about how they were able to have success in tonight’s matchup.

“My teammates kept looking for me,” Williams said. “They made a big emphasis on trying to go inside and the guys trusted me to be able to go in there and finish it. My teammates kept finding me down low in the post and I was able to capitalize on that tonight.”

“It’s a tribute to my teammates for being selfless and just being able to make the right pass,” Obanor said. “With or without my shot going in, there’s other things I can do to contribute. The threes went in today, but also my teammates keep making winning plays and I’m very grateful to play for such a winning team.”

Mark Adams talked about Williams and Obanor after the game and mentioned how proud he was of both players.

“You can see why they were recruited by everyone across the country," Adams said. "I’m just so blessed and fortunate that they picked Texas Tech. You saw Kevin Obanor hit those threes and every time he shoots it, we think it’s going in. He’s just an unbelievable three-point shooter and then Bryson is great at scoring. He can hit a three, but he’s also great around the basket and hard to stop. Two great offensive players and we’re fortunate to have them.”

The Red Raiders also got solid contributions from Marcos Santos Silva, who posted 13 points on 6 of 9 shooting and four rebounds, and Mylik Wilson who scored 5 points on 2 of 3 shots but added 7 assists, with a block and two steals. Davion Warren put up 14 points on 7 of 10 shooting, with 5 assists, 3 rebounds, and added 3 steals on the defensive end.

Adams noted in the postgame that Warren had a couple of huge steals for Texas Tech in the first half and said it was good to see him set the tone and lead the team on the defensive side of things.

Texas Tech asserted their dominance around the basket tonight with 54 points in the paint and secured a 44-23 advantage in the rebounding department, coming up with 20 offensive boards that led to 14 second chance points.

“Besides the way we shot the ball tonight, our rebounding was exceptional,” Adams said. “We put a lot of focus on that since our last scrimmage.”

While the Red Raiders put together a solid performance on the offensive end, Williams said after the game that the team still has a good amount of room to grow, but also noted the progress that he feels like they’ve been able to make so far while still gelling together and getting a feel for each other.

Texas Tech allowed 74 points on 46.3 percent shooting to a North Florida team that averaged 69.6 points on 44.5 percent shooting a season ago. Growth on the defensive end will be an area of need for the Red Raiders going forward and Adams said after the game that overall, this wasn’t the type of defensive effort they wanted.

“We made a couple of defensive adjustments at halftime,” Adams said. “We knew they were a great three-point shooting team, so we told the guys if we play them in a game of HORSE we’re going to be in trouble. We got a little more pressure on them, but I think some of our guy’s kind of overreacted to that and then we backed up a little bit more into some gaps and I thought that was much more productive for us.”

Adams noted that one of the big challenges this team faces is that mentally most of the guys on the team are offensive minded players.

“That’s what they’ve been doing their entire college career, they know how to score,” Adams said. “We easily scored 89 points, and I don’t think that’s going to be our weakness, it’s going to be getting these guys to play on both ends and really buy in on how important defense is."

Adams referred to the victory over North Florida as a great learning experience for the team. That playing a well-coached, disciplined team that’s sure in their identity and deliberate in their style of play, forced the Red Raiders to work on the defensive end and will benefit the team in the long run.

“Experience is the best teacher there is, and we’ll get a chance to go back, look at film, and talk to these guys,” Adams said. “I can assure you that the next game will be better, a lot better defensively.”