LORETTO, Pa. (Jan. 2, 2010) – The Saint Francis men's basketball team shot 54.8 percent from the field and 80.0 percent from the free throw line to ring in a new decade with a 64-52 victory over Hartford in both teams' non-conference finales on Saturday afternoon at DeGol Arena.
The Red Flash, who led from start to finish, made 12-of-14 (85.7 percent) free throw attempts in the final three minutes to thwart the Hawks' furious comeback attempt. SFU snapped a four-game losing streak with the victory and improved to 4-9 overall. Saint Francis will play the rest of its 29-game regular season schedule against Northeast Conference competition, beginning with a 7:30 p.m. tip-off on Thursday night, at St. Francis-NY.
Senior Devin Sweetney (Washington, DC /Riverdale Baptist) (Washington, D.C. / Riverdale Baptist) paced the Red Flash with a game-high 19 points on 6-of-8 shooting from the field. He also contributed eight rebounds, two assists and a steal. Freshmen Umar Shannon (Atlantic City, N.J. / Atlantic City) and Will Felder (Cleveland, OH/Lutheran East Hs) (Cleveland, Ohio / Lutheran East) chipped in with 12 and 10 points, respectively. Felder added four rebounds, while Shannon had career highs with six free throws attempted and made.
The Red Flash struck early with four points by Felder, while Shannon sunk a three to give SFU an early 7-0 lead. Clayton Brothers would finally get Hartford's firsts points with a bucket with a little under four minutes into the first half.
Junior Sorena Orandi (Vastra Frolunda, Sweden/Solebury Prep) (Vastra Frolunda, Sweden/Solebury Prep) hit back-to-back 3-pointers to give SFU a 14-5 lead that stretched to a 16-point advantage when Sweetney put up nine consecutive Red Flash points to give his team an early commanding lead of 23-7 with 10:49 to play in the first half. The Red Flash shot 90 percent from the floor (9-of-10) up to that point in the contest.
A jumper by Felder put SFU up 32-16 at halftime, as the Red Flash held the Hawks without a point in the last 3:20 of the half.
Sweetney had a game-high nine points in the first half as the Red Flash shot 66.7 percent (12-of-18) in the period. SFU held Hartford to 25.9 percent from the field (7-of-27) and 9.1 percent (1-of-11) from long distance.
Sweetney started the scoring in the second half, giving the Red Flash their largest lead of the game at 18 points, 34-16, just 30 seconds into the period.
However, Hartford began its comeback attempt with an 8-0 run that held Saint Francis scoreless for 7 minutes, 36 seconds. Junior Cedric Latimer (Los Angeles, CA /Windward) (Los Angeles, Calif. / Windward) made a layup to end the scoring drought, and give SFU a 36-24 lead with 11:54 to play.
The Hawks scored five straight points to end a 13-2 run that turned an 18-point Red Flash lead into a 36-29 ballgame with 10:43 to play
Senior Kurt Hoffman (Johnstown, PA /Greater Johnstown ) (Johnstown, Pa. / Greater Johnstown), who logged a career-high 34 minutes for Saint Francis, made a pair of free throws to make it a 45-35 lead with 6:52 to go. Hartford then got a pair of free throws from Joe Zeglinski and a slam dunk by Anthony Minor to pull within six points, 45-39, with 5:34 remaining. It was the closest the Hawks were since trailing 8-2 with 16:12 to play in the first half, and it was as close as they would get while the Red Flash closed the final 5:03 of the game by making 15-of-18 from the charity stripe.
Hoffman finished with five points, four rebounds and one assists, while Orandi had nine points, a career-tying six rebounds, two assists and one steal in a season-high 31 minutes of action.
Game Notes: Hartford scored 16 points in the first half, tying a season-low for a Red Flash opponent this season (Wagner)… Shannon had career highs with six free throws and six free throw attempts… Hartford's 52 points are the second-lowest total allowed by SFU this season… Hartford never led in the game… The Red Flash out-rebounded Hartford 34-20, and the 20 rebounds are a season-low for an SFU opponent.
Postgame Comments By Head Coach Don Friday:
Opening Statement
“My concern and my fear coming in here was with the layoff from not playing since December 22nd that we'd be a little bit flat. It was a long layoff, but it was a layoff that we needed with our young kids. I think our kids getting home for a couple of days for the holidays was really good for their mental health – and being away from it. I know it was good for our coaches too. To kind of do some looking introspectively with what we were doing. And we came back on the 27th after that layoff and tried to get back to some basics. Guarding the ball, rotation and getting some screens. I was delighted tonight to actually see that we got two or three moving screen calls. I think we got back to screening. Early on to go up 32-16, I thought that our defense allowed us to be on our toes. It got us going in transition with some easy buckets. If there is one negative from tonight, I thought we had some silly turnovers where guys tried to do too much.”
“I can't say enough about how our young kids came in and hit some big buckets here down the stretch. We didn't get rattled. We had to play through some adversity to win. We had a big lead. They cut it to six or seven. We had to win by being uncomfortable, where they started to make a run and we were able to answer with free throws and getting the ball to the free throw line and getting the ball to the right guys. That's progress, but we've still got work to do.”
Thoughts on coming out quick with a 9-for-10 effort from the field:
“I think our defense allowed us to get some of those looks. I thought our kids were pretty unselfish tonight.”
The team had a lot of hot and cold spurt todays:
“Some of those field goals at the end of the first half when we started to have that (scoring) drought, look back and some of those turnovers really broke our spirit. Maybe one of the signs that we are turning the corner, and we aren't there yet, but bad offense at that point didn't yield to bad defense. That's what tough teams have. I'm not ready to declare that a victory yet for us, but we're coming. We knew coming in here tonight that (Morgan) Sabia and (Joe) Zeglinski, they can really shoot the basketball. I thought we made Zeglinski work for a lot of his looks. He made some deep shots, but I think that's a credit to our kids and my staff. I thought my staff did a great job of preparing our kids for it.”
How nice of a win is this?
“Absolutely. It's a big win for many reasons. We come off a really tough non-league schedule. But that's part of the nature of the beast when small schools like us have to schedule up. It startles me. I looked the other night and Davidson, which was a bucket away from a Final Four a couple years ago, they play Division III. They played Vassar. I look at Cornell and they are playing Penn State-Behrend. We have a conference rule where they don't allow us to do that. But yet the Ohio States will feed on schools like us to try to get their kids confidence. And we don't do that. It's just so unfair to our kids at this level. Who are we to think that we can just go out there with a young team right now? This is the time that we really need it.”
How important was it to hit those free throws?
“It was huge. You don't want to come out of those possessions empty. That's what I was afraid of. In the first half, we were 12-for-18, we had 13 shots on the bucket in the second half. That has to change a little bit too. And I have to go back and look on the tape at that. I know exactly what our problems were too. Two things, we were dribbling the basketball too much out front. Was it fatigue perhaps? I went with a little bit of a shorter rotation today. I'm holding guys accountable to running what we want to run in our system. I don't want to build a foundation on top soil or mushroom soil. I want to build our foundation on bedrock and granite to be solid. So if guys aren't going screen, or if guys aren't going to defend or rotate or play hard, I can't play them. If you're going to turn the ball over, I gotta take you out because I have other kids who are capable. The two things that happened I know today. We were beating the ball during that stretch in the second half. And we weren't getting the ball below the free throw line. We were playing 25 to 30 feet from the bucket, and that's no way to play. So our kids will go back and we'll tune that up.”
Talk about the 34-20 rebounding edge:
“We had a couple if you remember, like one time (Latimer) had a great one. I thought he was going to go back up and dunk it, and he kicked it back out. That was a big one. Umar there at the end, we had a clock down call. He had two charges today and was just out of control. They are things that can be cleaned up. Again tonight, we played hard defensively. And when we didn't play well on offense, it didn't dictate bad defense. It allowed us to continue to play hard defensively. Sorena Orandi (Vastra Frolunda, Sweden/Solebury Prep) was a real big key tonight. If you look, he really played Zeglinski hard. He tied his career high with six rebounds again, it tells me that Sorena gets it. He's getting it, and understanding where we are trying to go. We can't be a fly up and down, trade buckets with you. We're going to have to grind you on defense, and we're going to have to be able to run out of our defense. The other part we have to grind, and then we can be good.”
“Kurt was again, he was really the glue. Here's the other thing we have been preaching. We have been talking to our kids about connecting with teammates. Screening, passing, communicating defensively, making the extra pass, making the play where you rotate to pick up a teammate, making somebody better with a dribble-drive and then a kick to the right guy. Connect with teammates. That was the theme for our program this whole week, and it's going to have to be the theme for our team down the stretch run. But it comes down to three initials and this is what it's all about for us right now. NEC. We are playing for a chance to compete in the NEC, and make the playoffs.”
Is the team ready for the Northeast Conference?
“As the 12th-place preseason pick, we really have to be humble and have to fight and grind for everything we want. Nobody is going to give us anything, and we're not going to get any respect. And we shouldn't until we earn it. I said to our kids the other day, if they wanted the Hartford win, Muhammad Ali said that his fight was won three months before he ever stepped in the ring – on a back road, in a ring with a sparring partner, or in a weight room in a training session. If we are going to make the playoffs, that run will be forged now in DeGol Arena, in our weight room, in our track, in our therapy room, or in the classroom. If our kids do it the right way there, we really have to develop here. We need a blue collar, lunch pale, work our rear-end off mentality. And if we do that, that's good enough. No gimmicks. Hard work!”
