PHILADELPHIA – The CAA schedule makers didn’t make things easy for Drexel at the start of conference play.
The Dragons began their conference slate with the hardest road trip in the league, having to fly
south to play the CAA’s perennial top dogs in Charleston and UNC-Wilmington, who have been the Coastal Athletic Association’s NCAA Tournament representative the last two seasons.
The Dragons returned to Philadelphia after the new year with two losses after losing a halftime lead at Charleston and struggling offensively at UNCW’s vaunted Trask Coliseum.
Things didn’t ease up at all for the Dragons as they hosted Hofstra, a team that had already taken down two power-conference squads on the road, beating Pittsburgh and Syracuse. Drexel’s late comeback bid fell short, falling 70-67 against Speedy Claxton’s Pride and now sitting at 0-3 in CAA play.
Putting two halves, and a full 40 minutes, together has been a trait that’s been lacking so far for Zach Spiker’s team, who now sit at 6-10 overall. Drexel has lost three games this season where it led at halftime. It also had games where a small deficit at the half ends up turning into a larger margin of defeat. Saturday’s loss was different as the Dragons found themselves down 40-25 at the half. Drexel made nine of their 32 shots in the first half, good for just 28%. The 3-point line wasn’t kind to the Dragons either, as they made just two of their 13 threes, a tick over 15%.
Spiker liked the way that Drexel has moved the ball well and got itself good looks in the early portion of their conference schedule, but the Dragons haven’t been able to convert consistently. It’s something that Spiker knows is holding his team back from putting a whole game together.
“We got to be consistent from a shooting standpoint,” Spiker said. “It was certainly a tale of two halves…I thought our quality of looks in the first half were similar to the second half, maybe some of them cleaner, to be honest. We went 5-for-28 [from 3] at UNC-Wilmington. I think 23-plus were quality down there as well. That’s going to happen. That’s basketball.”
In addition to the struggles shooting the ball from the field, the charity stripe has been anything but for Drexel.
After shooting 12-for-20 from the free throw line in Saturday’s loss and just 5-for-11 in the first half, Drexel is converting on 65.1% of their free throws and now sit at 343rd out of 365 Division-I teams in that category. It’s been a compounding problem on top of the poor field goal percentage.
“When we’ve had success over time, we’ve been good at the free throw line,” Spiker said. “We’re leaving some points at the foul line. We were 5-for-11 in the first half. All of those were one for twos. It would be great to get in there and get a couple.”
Despite the poor shooting first half, Drexel turned things on offensively in the second half, erasing a 15-point deficit as it finally saw the ball go through the hoop. The Dragons shot nearly 54% from the field, and made five of their seven threes for the game in the second half. Shane Blakeney and Eli Beard paced Drexel with nine points each in the second half, finishing as the Dragons’ lone scorers in double figures with 18 and 12 points, respectively.
Drexel also made a conscious effort defensively to press and speed up Hofstra, who wants to play at a snail’s pace, and, to use a football term, “run the clock out” when holding a lead. Hofstra turned the ball over seven times in the second half, and for the game, the Dragons scored 18 points off of nine giveaways by the Pride.
That was enough for Drexel to give itself a chance to send the game to overtime on the final possession. Villiam Garcia Adsten had a floater blocked by Hofstra’s German Plotnikov. Then Blakeney missed a three right before the buzzer expired.
Although the result of the game meant that Drexel was still without a win in CAA play, it showed its grit and ability in the second half. But it wasn’t enough against a Hofstra team that has one of the best players at the mid-major level in Cruz Davis and star freshman Preston Edmead. Davis, the second leading scorer in the CAA and a top 20 scorer nationally, dropped 20 points and dished out five assists. Edmead fouled out with just under seven minutes left in the game but still managed to score 16 points and make four of his five threes.
“They’re a program that’s had good guards,” Spiker said. “We can go all the way back to when Charles Jenkins played against [Drexel assistant coach] Frantz Massenat. They’re a talented team with talented guards.”
Although Drexel played a good first half at Charleston and led at halftime, and then gave a really good Hofstra team everything they could handle in the second half, there’s nothing in the win column for Drexel to show for it. Spiker likes the fight that his team displayed, but it’ll have to own its record thus far and turn the page. The Dragons will get Stony Brook at home on Thursday and then host 11-3 William & Mary on Saturday.
“We came up a little bit short, but there’s still some things that we can learn from,” Spiker said. “If you look at our effort, come back, and fight, we did that.
“We played three really good teams to start conference play. I just told our guys, we have to own it, live in it and do better. We need to play good basketball that’s deserving of winning. We’re going to continue to be about our process. We’ll continue to play who’s on the schedule. We won’t complain about it.”
