With Long Breaks Over, Crusaders Try to Regain Focus
WORCESTER, Mass. – The next couple of months will be a welcome change from the a recent 30-day stretch for Holy Cross. The reason is simple: since December 4, the Crusaders have played just three games, with a couple of very long breaks included.
While every team breaks for final exams, the Crusaders took a veritable leave of absence from games. After their contest on December 4, their next game was at Siena on December 22. They then lost at Sacred Heart on December 30. With such long breaks, is it any wonder the team lost its focus?
“We’ve lost our edge,” said head coach Ralph Willard. “There’s no bounce, especially on the offensive end right now. There’s no bounce, even on the defensive end we don’t have a bounce.
“We were playing great going into the break, and we played not great coming out of the break.”
Just about everyone else on the team could see the difference, as well as the lack of games being a partial explanation.
“I think we lost focus, because it was such a long break,” said Pat Doherty, who led the Crusaders with a career-high 20 points against the Terriers. “We were doing well, and I think guys relaxed.”
“We weren’t doing things that we were doing earlier in the season, so we knew that we had to come out with a lot of energy,” said junior forward Colin Cunningham, who scored 16 points Wednesday night. “What we really noticeably lacked in the two games that we lost was energy, so we wanted to come out with a lot of energy early.”
Now the games come with plenty of frequency. Two non-league contests remain (save for their BracketBusters game in February), both on the road as the Crusaders head to San Francisco and Maryland before opening Patriot League play at Lafayette. Only once will the Crusaders have a layoff of more than four days the rest of the way, a five-day span in between games later this month against Bucknell and Navy.
“The fact that all we’ve done is beat up on each other for basically the last month has not been a positive thing for our team,” said Willard. “The fact that we’re going to play some games now, even though they’re on the road, even though there’s going to be a lot of travel involved – we need to do this. We need to get back to improve by competing against other people.”
It started with Wednesday night’s win against Boston University in a game that saw the Terriers hang around and take the lead on several occasions. Even as they got the lead, you never got the feeling that the Terriers would take the game unless they stole it. The Crusaders could never break the game open, in part because they couldn’t get big man Tim Clifford going inside. Clifford was plagued by foul trouble, but the Crusaders also struggled to get him the ball.
One thing long layoffs like the ones Holy Cross had can do is help players heal nagging injuries, but that didn’t seem to happen for the Crusaders. Indeed, they entered Wednesday night’s game with even more injuries than they had before, and they were already a bit banged up. Now they’re almost a walking infirmary.
Eric Meister is perhaps the biggest loss, as the sophomore forward has been a key reserve inside all season and his loss takes away some inside depth. The Crusaders have a solid rebounding margin and haven’t been out-rebounded all season, but since Meister’s last game a month ago, the opponents have come closer each time and the Terriers were even on the boards with them despite not having a great deal of size.
Willard noted that there is a domino effect with Meister being out as well. As he gives them another good body inside, Willard can rest Clifford and Alex Vander Baan more, allowing them to be more effective later in the game. Now he doesn’t have that luxury, instead turning to Greg McCarthy off the bench and having to play his starters more minutes. They hope Meister can be back before the end of the month.
Even before the long stretch with few games, there were times when the Crusaders weren’t playing well despite winning. Willard was clearly not happy with how they played against Harvard and Ohio, but both games were wins, and they won at Saint Joseph’s on December 4. This team certainly doesn’t have the talent or depth that they have had in past years, and departed guards Torey Thomas and Keith Simmons arguably meant more to this team than any two players in the country who departed meant to their team. But they’re now 8-3 and have the best RPI in the Patriot League by a wide margin, all of which seems to bode well for them.
If the Crusaders fully regain their focus, they appear to be in good shape as Patriot League play beckons. Getting back on track with a win against a cross-state rival will help. Doherty thinks the practices are getting better, and winning never hurts.
“We just needed a win, and this is a win we’re going to build on,” said Willard.
