Knights Move Closer to Repeating in the Northeast
by Ray Floriani
TEANECK, N.J. – Success in any conference starts with defending your home turf. The home court affords familiarity and fan support. Simply, it is a place where the guests are on edge. The road in college basketball is often filled with pot holes of cold shooting nights and turnovers. Win your home games and at least get a split on the road and you are in good position.
In the one-bid world of the Northeast Conference, home court takes on added importance. The top eight of the eleven teams qualify for the conference post season tournament. And the entire tournament utilizes a format where games are on the home floor of the higher seed. So home contests are crucial in the NEC.
On Monday evening, Fairleigh Dickinson made a major move toward defending their NEC title. The Knights scored a 98-73 come-from-behind victory over Robert Morris at the Rothman Center. The win put FDU at 10-2 in conference play, while the Colonials fell to 7-5. In the early going, it looked like a long night for FDU.
“Robert Morris is talented,” said FDU coach Tom Green. “When they jumped out to that early lead I was really scared. Fortunately we tightened up our defense on the perimeter and regrouped.”
FDU was fortunate to be ahead by one, 39-38, at intermission. In the second half, the Knights decided to utilize their height advantage – specifically, 7-0 sophomore Andrea Crosariol.
“We talked about going to Andrea down low at halftime,” Green said. “He’s our horse inside and he gives us a good size advantage.”
At the outset of last season, Crosariol, a native of Italy, was a prototype European player, a seven-footer that enjoyed shooting from the perimeter. As the year wore on, he gradually established himself inside and had a good showing against Illinois in last season’s NCAA tournament. This season, he’s picked up where he left off. Robert Morris had no one or answer to stop the him on the low blocks. He finished with 24 points and essentially allowed FDU to break the game open over the course of the final twenty minutes.
Chad Timberlake added 21 points for the Knights and Gordon Klaiber chipped in with 15. For the Colonials, A.J. Jackson led the way with 17 points while Derek Coleman and Tony Lee both had 16.
To be the first NEC school since Rider (in ’93 and ’94) to repeat as champions, FDU must concentrate on the defensive end.
“We gave about 28-30 minutes of solid defense tonight,” Green said. “We still gave up 13 offensive rebounds. That’s too much. We just have to get better defensively.”
On the offensive end, Green was especially pleased with the turnover numbers. For the game, FDU had 14 in that department, but only three in that second half as they established control and put the game away.
For now, with the home stretch around the corner, FDU is in good shape. The remainder of the week calls for a game at LIU followed by a home date with Mount St.Mary’s. Following those two contests FDU will face a stretch of 4 games in seven days.
“That stretch is going to be crazy,” Green admitted. “We have a BracketBuster game (February 18) at Wisconsin Green Bay. It’s going to be a tough trip. Just getting there we have to take two planes and spend about 6 hours en route.”
Following the Bracket Buster, which Green notes will be challenging, FDU travels home and that Monday for a trip to always tough Monmouth. Despite the arduous stretch, Green is optimistic.
“At this point,” he said, “we control our own destiny.”
Game Notes
- Robert Morris coach Mark Schmidt was less than pleased with his club’s showing. Thirty minutes past the final buzzer, the Colonials were still in the locker room meeting with the coaching staff.
- Things got so tough for Robert Morris that Jeremy Chappell went in for an uncontested dunk at the final buzzer and drew nothing but rim.
- FDU followed up the win on Monday with a solid 96-74 triumph at LIU on Thursday. The road win moved FDU even closer to realizing their goal of repeating as NEC champions.
