December 4, 2009
After playing seven of its first eight games on the road to open up the season, Cornell returns to Newman Arena Sunday for a 2 p.m. tipoff against Saint Joseph’s University. Despite suffering its first loss of the season to Seton Hall at home, which snapped a 21-game home unbeaten streak, the Red will take the floor riding a four-game winning streak.
“It’s always fun to be able to play in front of a great home crowd, especially when the students are in session,” said senior small forward Ryan Wittman. “It gives us a lot of energy and we’re really looking forward to it after playing a majority of our games on the road to start the year.”
“We’ve had such a great following here,” said head coach Steve Donahue. “It’s a terrific basketball atmosphere. Fans have done a good job in particular of coming out and supporting us, so we’re excited to play in front of our home crowd. The Seton Hall game was a terrific environment. Unfortunately, we just didn’t play well enough to win that game, but we’re excited about this Sunday.”
Saint Joseph’s (3-3, 0-0 Atlantic-10) will look to halt a three-game losing skid after opening up the season with three consecutive victories over Drexel, Holy Cross and Boston College. The Hawks rely on a balanced offensive attack as four players have averaged in double figures through the team’s first six contests. Saint Joseph’s is led by a strong, veteran backcourt, which includes seniors Darrin Govens and Garrett Williamson.
Govens, who notched his 1,000th career point in an 81-73 loss at Rider Monday night, paces Saint Joseph’s with 12.5 points per game. Williamson, the Hawks’ captain, was named to the Preseason Atlantic-10 All-Defensive Team after earning A-10 All-Defensive honors last season.
“I’m familiar with their program as Coach [Phil] Martelli’s done a great job over his 15 years there,” Donahue said. “They’re going to play hard and share the ball. They do have good balance in Govens and Williamson in particular and Hilliard has done a good job over his career. It’s a good basketball team. They’re not going to beat themselves.”
The Hawks, selected to finish 10th in their conference according to the preseason coaches’ Poll, sport a perfect 3-0 record all-time against Cornell (6-2, 0-0 Ivy). The two teams met last year for the first time in 26 years and Saint Joseph’s utilized two runs, 20-7 and 10-0, in the second half to erase the Red’s 44-38 lead en route to a 71-67 victory at the Palestra. Last season’s Atlantic-10 Player of the Year Ahmad Nivins scored a game-high 26 points and grabbed 16 rebounds in the game. Fortunately for Cornell, Nivins was selected by the Dallas Mavericks with the 56th overall pick of the 2009 NBA draft last June.
“We had the lead going into halftime and we weren’t able to hold on,” Wittman said, referring to last year’s contest. “This year we have given up a couple of runs, like at Bucknell, but the difference is we’ve been able to respond to those and take the lead back. Obviously, you wouldn’t like to see those teams go on big runs like that. It starts on the defensive end, which is something we definitely need to improve on. It’s going to be a focal point during the next few practices for Sunday.”
While Saint Joseph’s outrebounded Cornell, 32-26, last season in the head-to-head match up, it is clear the Hawks do not soar at the same altitude this year. Martelli’s squad ranks last in the conference in rebounds this season and has been outrebounded in all but one game thus far.
“We’re a strong rebounding team,” Donahue said. “It should be a strength of ours. St. Joe’s really handed it to us on the boards last year. They did a great job. They play great competition, so I wouldn’t read too much into their numbers this early in the season. They do play three guards and they have a couple new front court kids that are getting acclimated, but in general I think [they are] going to be a solid rebounding team by the time the season’s over.”
Whatever edge Cornell might have enjoyed on the boards may be diminished by the absence of senior power forward Alex Tyler, who missed the Red’s last three games with an upper calf injury. Expect to see junior Adam Wire and senior Mark Coury fill the void in the frontcourt for the Red. Wire has started consecutive games in Tyler’s spot, including Cornell’s 104-98 win at Bucknell Wednesday night.
The conclusion of Sunday’s game will mark the beginning of a two-week hiatus for Cornell as the team receives some time off during the final exams period. The Red will restart its season on Dec. 20 and 21 during the Holiday Festival at Madison Square Garden. Cornell will face Davidson and either Saint John’s or Hofstra in the second game. The following week the Red will travel to La Salle to square off against the Explorers on Dec. 29 before returning home for two games against Penn State Erie and Bryant University. The non-conference portion of the schedule will be highlighted on Jan. 6 by a trip to Allen Fieldhouse and a battle with the nation’s No. 1 team, the Kansas Jayhawks.
No comments:
Post a Comment