Photo credit: Greg Fiume
By Scott Greaney (@ScottGreaney_)
In a rowdy Saturday night atmosphere at the Charles ‘Entertainment’ Smith Center, it was the continuous lapses on defense from GW that led to their demise in an 80-70 loss against La Salle. The Revolutionaries (14-6, 3-4 A-10) have now lost three straight games and have fallen to 7th in the A-10 standings.
Both teams came into Saturday night’s contest on losing streaks. GW dropped their two previous road games against UMass and Richmond, while the Explorers (11-9, 2-5 A-10) dropped their last four conference games.
From the opening tip, it seemed as if the return home also marked the return of GW’s perimeter defense, causing the Explorers to miss their first seven shots from the field. However, the Revolutionaries also had trouble mustering up any sort of offense, missing their first seven shots from beyond the arc. After an 8-0 Explorers run gave La Salle the lead seven minutes in (yes, I know, this game was the game of sevens), they would end up not relinquishing the lead for the rest of the contest.
Despite a rocky shooting half from GW (12-of-32 from the field, 2-of-10 from deep), they found themselves only down four at halftime. The Revolutionaries would make a handful of small runs in the second half, but La Salle head coach Fran Dunphy’s pair of junior guard Khalil Brantley and senior guard Jhamir Brickus took every GW punch and threw one back.
“I thought we had pretty good dribble penetration, Brantley made some really good plays, Brickus made some really good plays…we made shots, they didn’t.” Dunphy said.
Brickus had a stellar performance in the second half, scoring 15 of his 19 points in the half, including a pair of miraculous three-pointers to effectively put the contest out of reach. “He’s just so smart, he’s got such a great pace to his game,” Dunphy said. Brickus carved up the GW defense off the dribble, scoring La Salle’s final 13 points to close out the victory.
GW tried to counter La Salle’s heavy pick and rolls by switching on screens to prevent open shots off the screen. However, this move often left GW with a size mismatch as graduate center Babatunde ‘Stretch’ Akingbola was found guarding Brantley and Brickus out near the three-point line. Not the ideal matchup for GW.
A glaring statistic in Saturday’s loss was the stark contrast from beyond the three-point line. The Revolutionaries, one of the strongest shooting teams from deep (34th per KenPom), shot just 3-of-18 from beyond the arc, whereas the Explorers, not particularly known for their perimeter shooting (196th per KenPom), shot 10-of-19 from three-point range.
GW head coach Chris Caputo acknowledged his frustration with the team’s defensive performances over the past 3 games. “Ultimately, you’re going to have to make people miss…I got to do a better job with the makeup of our team, getting us better defensively somehow right now,” Caputo said.
Over the past two seasons under Caputo, we’ve seen a high-speed offense that can put up anywhere from 75 to 85 points on a nightly basis. However, there have been and will continue to be nights like Saturday, where shots just aren’t falling, and the team will have to rely on its defense to grind it out for a conference win. The electric atmosphere of the Smith Center, largely thanks to George’s Army and the Foghorns, can provide a hostile environment for opposing teams, but the team simply has to have more of a defensive presence to keep the crowd in games like this one.
In spite of an overall disappointing performance from the Revolutionaries, Darren Buchanan Jr. once again proved to be a beast in the paint and attacking the rim downhill, finishing with 24 points and 12 rebounds. He appeared to sustain a right knee injury in the second half but returned to the court shortly after. Caputo said that Buchanan and Garrett Johnson have been battling through some lingering injuries, but remain available.
The Revolutionaries hit the road again Tuesday as they face the A-10 Goliath, Dayton, who is currently ranked #16. The Friars will surely be looking to bounce back from their surprising road loss against Richmond. Tip-off is scheduled for 7 p.m. and I will be once again on the live coverage for the blog. The game can be streamed on ESPN+.
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