BOSTON – Northeastern didn’t win Wednesday night’s game as comfortably as they probably should have. The Huskies had a 16-point lead early in the second half and appeared to be dominating William & Mary, which one might expect given that the Huskies came in undefeated in CAA play and the Tribe was a game out of the cellar and mired in a seven-game losing streak. In the end, they won 95-91 in double overtime, and head coach Bill Coen breathing a sigh of relief tells you how much the bottom line is what counts.
“We were very, very fortunate tonight to come away with a victory,” said Coen. “A lot of teams, after surrendering a 15-point halftime lead, wouldn’t be able to find a way to win. It speaks to this group because they stuck together, they believed in one another.”
The Huskies improved to 7-0 in CAA play for the first time since joining the conference. The non-conference slate was a streaky one for the Huskies, as they started off 4-1 before losing five in a row. For a lot of it, they looked like a team without their leader, and their most talented player didn’t seem like himself. That has changed on both counts, and along with the continued maturation of a key freshman it has made a big difference.
In some ways Wednesday night looked like the old Huskies, as the backcourt of Jonathan Lee and Joel Smith is not only back together, but they led the way in this win. Lee played all 50 minutes, looking like he’s just about all the way back from a foot injury that cost him two months, and had 19 points on 7-13 shooting, including a key three-pointer in the last minute of the second overtime that put Northeastern up by six. Smith tied a career high with 29 points on 11-14 shooting and added four assists, with 25 of his points coming after the first half.
“We need them to play at an elite level if we’re going to compete for a CAA championship,” said Coen. “They’re competitors, they want to win and they’re leaders.”
They also helped lead a Husky offense that handed out 21 assists with just 11 turnovers, and no Husky had more turnovers than assists on the evening. In CAA play, the Huskies have 110 assists and 75 turnovers, averages of 15.7 and 10.7 per game, respectively.
The other end of the experience spectrum is where you find another key to Wednesday’s win and many others of late. Freshman David Walker, who they were high on all along, seems to have accelerated his growth since the calendar turned over to 2013. While Walker had numbers that stood out on Wednesday night – a career-high 17 points on 7-9 shooting along with a team-high five assists – that hasn’t been his value. Instead, it’s been with his basketball I.Q. and the Huskies using him at the top of their zone. It gives teams a different look with him being 6’6″, and he’s grown comfortable with it. Right now he’s one of the better glue guys around.
“He’s a gym rat, I saw him in the gym earlier today,” said Smith, who had plenty of praise for how Walker has developed since arriving on campus.
The Huskies’ surge to a 7-0 start has also included Quincy Ford looking more like himself at times. For much of non-conference, the sophomore forward was a missing piece. His numbers were fine, but watching the game would tell a different story as he often didn’t look like much of a factor. He didn’t do much on Wednesday, but he did reach double digits in scoring for the fifth straight game and is second on the team in scoring in CAA play and is starting to fill the stat sheet again on a regular basis.
That Northeastern allowed the Tribe to come back and force overtime is concerning. They didn’t maintain their level of play from the first 25 minutes of the game, although some credit goes to William & Mary since they didn’t play well up to that point. Northeastern had not trailed for more than 142 minutes of game action before Brandon Britt put William & Mary ahead with two free throws early in the first overtime.
The Huskies may have needed Wednesday’s game to keep them grounded as the wins keep piling up. It’s not that they have had trouble focusing, and they know a tough one is ahead with George Mason coming to Matthews Arena on Sunday night. But it may help, especially since the bottom line didn’t change: they won the game. That makes it easier to take lessons out of the game.
