LORETTO, Pa. (Jan. 14, 2010) – Four players scored in double digits for the Saint Francis men's basketball team, but the youthful Red Flash had a tough time against the Monmouth zone defense in a 63-53 defeat on Thursday night at DeGol Arena.
SFU fell to 4-12 overall, and 2-3 in the Northeast Conference, with its third straight loss. The Red Flash will try to bounce back with a 7 p.m. tilt against Fairleigh Dickinson on Saturday night. Saint Francis will honor the late, great Norm Van Lier by hanging his jersey with the all-time Red Flash greats, during a pregame ceremony in the Stokes-Twyman Room, prior to tipoff.
Freshman Anthony Ervin (Chesterfield, Va./Fork Union Military Academy) (Chesterfield, Va. / Fork Union Military Academy) led all Saint Francis scorers with 12 points on a 5-for-8 night from the field. Junior Sorena Orandi (Vastra Frolunda, Sweden/Solebury Prep) (Vastra Frolunda, Sweden / Solebury Prep) and freshman Umar Shannon (Atlantic City, N.J. / Atlantic City) had 11 points each, and freshman Will Felder (Cleveland, OH/Lutheran East Hs) (Cleveland, Ohio / Lutheran East) added 10 points. Shannon also tied a career high with four assists, and had two rebounds and one steal. Orandi added three rebounds and three assists, and Felder contributed eight rebounds, two blocks and one steal. Senior Devin Sweetney (Washington, DC /Riverdale Baptist) (Washington, D.C. / Riverdale Baptist) had a career high 15 rebounds, and moved into 16th on the school's all-time boards list, while also tallying seven points and one block.
Monmouth sophomore Travis Taylor led all scorers with 20 points on 10-of-15 shooting, Justin Sofman added 15 points and four steals, and Whitney Coleman had 13 points and three assists. The Hawks improved to 4-1 in the Northeast Conference and 8-9 overall with their fifth straight victory.
The first half was a back-and-forth affair that featured six tie scores and five lead changes. The teams traded buckets over the first 10 minutes of the contest. Felder's 15-foot jumper put the Red Flash on top 8-6 just over five minutes in. But Taylor got his own rebound after a Felder block and tipped it back in to tie it at 8-8. Dutch Gaitley put Monmouth on top, 10-8, with a 10-footer and then Taylor got a dunk in transition to make it 12-8 with 9:40 to play in the first half. Felder went to the free throw line for two shots with 7:49 remaining and made both to snap a 6 minute, 57 second scoreless drought, and a 6-0 Monmouth run, to make it 12-10.
Saint Francis would tie the score four times before Shannon would get his first opportunity for points at the free throw line. He made both free throws with 47.9 seconds remaining in the half to give SFU its first lead since early on, 21-19. But Sofman made a 3-pointer from the elbow to give the lead right back to Monmouth, 22-21, with 26 seconds left. The Hawks would take that 22-21 lead into the break.
Both teams struggled from the field in the first half. The Red Flash were 7-for-22 from the field (.318) and just 3-of-11 from long distance (.273). Monmouth hit on 10-of-28 field goal attempts (.357) and 2-of-7 from outside the arc (.286). SFU made all four of its free throw attempts, while the Hawks went 0-for-4 from the charity stripe.
Ed Waite scored the first points of the second half to make it a three-point lead for Monmouth, 24-21, and Taylor made it a two possession game, 26-21, with a layup. Orandi would get SFU's offense started with a 3-pointer from the corner to make it 26-24. Felder made the back end of two free throws to cut Monmouth's lead to 26-25 before Taylor answered with another dunk at the other end to make it a three-point contest, 28-25. However, Orandi found Shannon on the elbow for a wide open 3-pointer to tie the ballgame at 28-28.
But Whitney Coleman answered at the other end to give the lead back to the Hawks, 31-28. Orandi again drove the lane to find Sweetney streaking along the baseline. Sweetney was fouled on a dunk attempt, and made both free throw attempts to pull the Red Flash within 31-30 with 16:09 remaining. But that's as close as Saint Francis would get the rest of the way.
Taylor put another deuce back to give the Hawks a 33-30 lead, and start a 12-0 Monmouth run that spanned almost six minutes. In total, the Hawks would outscore the Red Flash 17-3 over 8:21 to take an insurmountable 48-34 lead with 8:00 remaining in the game.
The Hawks took their largest lead, 55-40, with 4:17 to go, on a 3-pointer from the elbow by Sofman. The Red Flash would score the games next six points to cut the lead to nine, 55-46, with 2:42 left and had a chance to get closer after a defensive stop, but a turnover gave the ball back to Monmouth, which closed out the final 2:15 by going 8-for-10 from the free throw line. The Hawks made two of their first nine free throw attempts in the game before making eight of the final 10.
Game Notes: Senior Devin Sweetney (Washington, DC /Riverdale Baptist) remains 19th on Saint Francis' all-time scoring list with 1,267 points, but moved into 16th on the program's all-time rebounds list with 659. He moved past William Saller (1952-56), who had 653 rebounds during his career; the Red Flash tied a season high with 20 turnovers for the third consecutive game; SFU out-rebounded its fourth straight opponent; Freshman Umar Shannon scored in double digits for the sixth time in the last seven games, and tied a career high with four assists; Freshman Will Felder (Cleveland, OH/Lutheran East Hs) had two blocks to take the team lead with 10 on the season.
Head Coach Don Friday Post-Game Quotes:
“I give a lot of credit to Monmouth. I thought they came in and they played extremely hard and they were very well balanced offensively and defensively. With that being said, we have to become very poised with the basketball in knowing where we are going to get shots and how we are going to get shots. It's obvious right now that we are lacking an inside presence.”
“With three freshmen leading the charge for us, we need some of our upperclassmen to play. And with Devin tonight, he had a rough night. His rebound line was terrific, but we're not going to win many games with him going 1-for-12 from the floor and with six turnovers. Now I have to look back and see what accountability I have with the way we are deploying him or getting him the right shots. We've got to get that rectified quickly. And at the same time, we have to settle into something defensively here. When people start making some shots, we lose some people and we get tentative as coaches. We move into man-to-man, and a team like Monmouth will lock in on you and start chopping you up. We can't let that happen. I thought in the first half we had them off balance, but we weren't scoring the basketball area. We ran into too many scoring droughts. That's what we have to correct here.”
