When the Latvian sharpshooter catches fire, he’s hard to extinguish.

Junior forward Rihards Kuksiks had a career-high 27 points and knocked down seven of ASU’s team-record 18 3-pointers as the Sun Devils stomped San Francisco 104-65 on Friday at Wells Fargo Arena.

The 104 points were the most points scored by ASU under coach Herb Sendek and the first time it scored more than 100 points since 2002.

The first half was sheer domination as ASU shot 75.9 percent from the field and 71.4 percent from 3-point land to grab a 58-23 halftime lead.

The Sun Devils (4-0) went on a key run about midway through the first half to begin the rout. Up 24-15 with 10:34 remaining in the period, ASU went on a 13-0 run that saw USF go 5:24 without scoring.

ASU vs. USF highlights, State Press Television
By Master Tesfatsion

“I thought in the first half we played outstanding basketball on both ends of the court,” Sendek said. “Offensively, I thought our guys really executed the game plan, made each other better, and most significantly made just about every shot. It was one of those nights; we just made a lot of shots.”

Kuksiks’ 27 points came in only 26 minutes of play as he went 7-of-13 from beyond the arc.

“I basically give all the credit to my teammates for finding me,” Kuksiks said. “All I had to do was just put it in the basket.”

Kuksiks wasn’t the only one lighting up the scoreboard. Four other players had double digits in points. Freshman forward Trent Lockett (19), junior guard Ty Abbott (11), sophomore forward Taylor Rohde (11) and senior guard Derek Glasser (10) provided a balanced attack for which USF had no answer.

As a team, the Sun Devils dished out 29 assists, which is tied for the seventh-best mark in school history and their highest total since 2004.

Kuksiks led the team with eight assists while Glasser added seven assists to pass Eddie House and move into sixth place all-time in ASU history.

“I think of our first 12 baskets, all 12 came on assists,” Sendek said. “To have 29 out of 38 baskets assisted is a really good stat line for us.”

Defensively, ASU was able to shut down the Dons’ two leading scorers.
Senior forward Dior Lowhorn entered the game averaging 22 points per game but was held to 12 points and fouled out after only 24 minutes of play.

Sophomore guard Kwame Vaughn came into the game averaging 19.5 points per game but didn’t score a single point in the first half. All of his 17 points in the game came in the second half after all of ASU’s starters were pulled.

With a marquee matchup against Duke next week in New York, the Sun Devils showed no signs of looking ahead.

“We haven’t talked about next week; we really turned the page following the TCU game and focused on this game,” Sendek said. “You can only play your next game. You can’t play your whole schedule at the same time so I thought our guys did a good job focusing on this game.”

ASU is next in action on Wednesday in the semifinals of the Preseason NIT, where they will take on No. 9 Duke at Madison Square Garden.

Reach the reporter at kyle.glaser@asu.edu.