MBB holds on to beat Drexel 70-67

[mat1992 2,237]

https://towsontigers.com/news/2024/1/25/mens-basketball-tarke-may-lead-mens-basketball-to-70-67-win-against-drexel-on-thursday.aspx

[Bay Area Tiger 347]

Yes!!!  Missed entire game.  Awesome to glance after and see 70-67!

That home marque win we’ve been longing for. 
 

Edited January 26 by Bay Area Tiger

[sr16 158]

 

 

[TuTigers2012 1,071]

40 minutes ago, Bay Area Tiger said:

Yes!!!  Missed entire game.  Awesome to glance after and see 70-67!

That home marque win we’ve been longing for. 
 

You missed a very Towson game. Big lead down to a possession a few times. Questionable decisions and awful foul shooting. They have at home toughness. Drexel is the most similar team to us. Glad we play them once in the regular season. It’s nice to win a game no relying on outside shooting. End of game execution needs to improve.  Pat had no patience for the freshmen today. Luckily some good minutes early from jones and may. Lowery was solid. Williams is a handful. Thankfully spiker had him on the bench more than he should have. 

Big three game stretch coming up. Wish we didn’t throw away one of those first two Ls 

[mat1992 2,237]

Sorry guys. A bit late here, but let's start with the Good, Bad, and Ugly.  

Good

*Great win. Towson improves to 5-2 in the CAA and has now won 17 straight home games.

*Home crowd of over 2,800. It rocked pretty well tonight. Even had a slight traffic jam going home after the press conference. When you hit it hard with marketing and special prices for concessions and tickets, you see the result. It helps the team and it also helps if the team is pretty good.

*Yes, Towson is pretty good. After the Monmouth loss, nobody thought we'd beat UNCW, Charleston and Drexel.

*Rebounding +5 was huge. Lowery with five assists and a huge block. Paar and Jones combined for 14 points and four rebounds. Sulaiman with 8 boards. Tarke with 18 points, 5 rebs. and 3 assists.

 

Bad

*Long drought from about 9:30 to 3:30 where we scored just four points. 

*Williamson and Tejada combined for 2 for 14. Dylan also had no assists and I thought he dribbled a bit too much tonight. Tejada couldn't finish inside and took just 1 three-pointer. Going inside against Amari Williams can be an adventure.

Ugly

*Free throw shooting. Towson is one of the worst teams in the nation (62.5%, 355th). They certainly showed that tonight (14 of 24) as every FT down the stretch was 1 for 2 until Williamson made both with around 13 seconds left. Fortunately, Towson did not foul and allowed Justin Moore to take a contested 3 at the buzzer.

 

[Chris Datres 423]

We've seen in these last couple of games just how much Tarke solidifies our backcourt.  He's the veteran presence that was sorely needed and missed at the beginning of the season.  The defense in the middle part of the 2nd half was outstanding and allowed for us to get out to the big lead.  But as Mat mentioned, the drought hits and the shot selection was a touch questionable and before you know it, the Dragons are right back in it.  Fortunate that DW knocked down those 2 free throws to get it to 3 because there's no doubt that if it had been a 1 or 2-point game, Drexel was going to the rack with it and based on what happened the final 2-3 minutes, they were going to get a good look at the rim.

So now we've knocked off the other top 3 teams in the conference, one of them at their place.  It would be great if we could treat Delaware on Saturday the way we treated JMU when we booted them out of the conference a couple years ago.

[mat1992 2,237]

It's hard to believe that a team that is shooting around 62.5% from the free throw line is 5-2 in the CAA and 12-8 overall, but here we are. Defense and rebounding are old staples and that's why we won. Holding a pretty good shooting team to 39% from the field and outrebounding a great rebounding team by five is where the game was won.

BTW, Towson is now 4-0 in games decided by six points or less. I know, the Bryant game went double overtime and you could put that in that column. But despite the very poor clutch FT shooting, this team does other things well that helps them close out close games. They rebound, they get loose balls, they close out, they have length (Lowery, Tejada) that they didn't have last season. They also have Tarke, who I guess Skerry wished he had from the jump. Big guard (6-3, 210) who can rebound, defense, pass the ball, can drive and doesn't mind taking tough 3s. Four turnovers tonight for him tough two came on drives and I wonder if there was condensation on the floor due to the weather outside. All I know is that take away the Bryant game where he barely played, and this team is 7-2 with him as a starter. Not a star, but he's the closest thing we have to one.

[TSU88 1,073]

If you told me before the game that Tejada would score 1 point, CT was going to foul out, and we were only going to hit 4 3’s, I’d have told you we were going to get blown out. Go figure. Before touching on the positives, the elephant 🐘 in the room is the atrocious foul shooting. I have no doubt they work on it in practice, but it’s not translating to the games. Maybe they need a sports psychologist or hire a foul shooting savant to coach em up, I dunno.

I love Tarke's game. When he drives to the basket, good things often happen. I thought CT was good on offense tonight, and even though he only had 4 boards, May & Suliaman combined for 18 rebounds. Kudos to Paar who chipped in with a couple nice baskets, and credit is due to my favorite whipping guy, Jones, who was 4-4 from the floor. And another nice game from Lowery, our Swiss Army knife, who had 5 assists. 

If you told me we'd be 5-2 in conference play, with 3 of those games against UNCW, C of C & Drexel, I'd have said sign me up for that, in a heartbeat. Make no mistake, this team has flaws, but they deserve credit for establishing themselves thus far as a legit candidate to finish in the top 4 in the conference. 

On to Delaware.

[mat1992 2,237]

2 minutes ago, Chris Datres said:

We've seen in these last couple of games just how much Tarke solidifies our backcourt.  He's the veteran presence that was sorely needed and missed at the beginning of the season.  The defense in the middle part of the 2nd half was outstanding and allowed for us to get out to the big lead.  But as Mat mentioned, the drought hits and the shot selection was a touch questionable and before you know it, the Dragons are right back in it.  Fortunate that DW knocked down those 2 free throws to get it to 3 because there's no doubt that if it had been a 1 or 2-point game, Drexel was going to the rack with it and based on what happened the final 2-3 minutes, they were going to get a good look at the rim.

So now we've knocked off the other top 3 teams in the conference, one of them at their place.  It would be great if we could treat Delaware on Saturday the way we treated JMU when we booted them out of the conference a couple years ago.

It would be nice to kick the crap out of Delaware, but coming off an emotional win where we nearly blew it, I'd take a split. Hopefully, we punish them down low and Williamson and Tejada bounce back from bad games to propel us. I'm not saying we're Charleston from last season, but it helps to have depth where guys can pick you up when others are down. 

[mat1992 2,237]

Forgot to mention May, who had 10 rebounds. I don't think he's a shutdown defender yet, but sometimes, when a guy gets hot like Justin Moore, I'd rather have May guarding him than Tarke or Lowery. I like that he finished on that drive in the second half and then got fouled on his next drive. He's not a star and may never be that guy (needs a handle and a left hand), but he's becoming a pretty good player. Also needs to dunk it in close and not just lay it up. Watch him in layup drills and he should be dunking or at least attempting to jam it in close. Same with CT but that's another story.