La Salle knocks off St. Joseph’s in A-10 men’s tourney, 63-56
La Salle's men's team was up for the challenge of pushing back St. Joseph's efforts to claim a victory in their series of games this season.
After La Salle beat St. Joseph’s for the second time just one week ago, Explorers coach Ashley Howard noted that it’s hard to beat any team three times in one season.
La Salle proved to be up for the challenge on Wednesday, defeating the Hawks 63-56 in the first round of the Atlantic 10 Tournament at the Capital One Arena in Washington.
“I’m proud of our guys; they battled,” Howard said. “Our defensive effort and intensity was really good during the course of the game.”
Propelled by a 19-7 run to end the first half, the Explorers were able to defeat the Taylor Funk-less Hawks by capitalizing on turnovers and establishing a two-man game between Clifton Moore and Jack Clark. (Funk suffered a season-ending hand injury in last week’s loss to La Salle.)
The Hawks came back in the second half — cutting the Explorers’ lead to one point with six minutes to play — but they couldn’t erase a 12-point halftime deficit in the end.
“Credit to La Salle,” said St. Joe’s coach Billy Lange. “[The Explorers] are playing really well right now. They have quick and feisty guards that are hard to go against.”
Charles Coleman led St. Joe’s off the bench with 18 points.
Clark led La Salle with 20 points, and Moore scored 19.
Two-man game
Clark scored eight of La Salle’s first 11 points. The Explorers were hot offensively, making six of their first eight shots. Moore followed Clark’s lead by scoring 13 early points, solidifying a two-man attack between the guard and forward.
St. Joe’s hung with the Explorers, though, making nine of its first 13 shots.
Just six minutes into the first half, the Hawks had already scored more points (16) than they scored in the entire second half of last week’s meeting (15).
The score was knotted at 20 at the under-12 timeout. Over the next 10 minutes, La Salle started pulling away, going on a 19-3 run, extending its lead to 16 with a minute left to play in the first half. St. Joe’s was 1-for-15 from the field and committed five turnovers during the run.
The Explorers’ lead was 39-27 at the half, their lead trimmed to 12 after two St. Joe’s layups in the final minute of the opening 20.
Hawks storm back
St. Joe’s opened the second half on a 14-7 run, cutting its deficit to five at the under-12 timeout. La Salle made only three of 17 field goals during the stretch, looking like an entirely different team after the half.
St. Joe’s would cut the La Salle lead to 48-47 with 6:06 to play, but La Salle survived with big shots by Moore and Christian Ray.
Although Coleman didn’t start the game for the Hawks, the 6-foot-10 center had a major imprint on the game. After making just two of his 12 three-point attempts this season, he made four of his five attempts Wednesday. Coleman and Ejike Obinna played together for the majority of the contest.
“Coleman hit some big shots to keep the game close,” said Howard. “We didn’t game plan for him to shoot 4-for-5 from three.”
La Salle starting guard Anwar Gill, a Washington native playing in in front of family and friends, had 7 points, 4 assists, and 4 rebounds.
Way-too-early look at next season
Obinna announced in the postgame press conference that he is coming back next season. Funk has one year of eligibility remaining, but it is unclear if he will be back. There is also speculation that Jordan Hall could test the waters in the NBA draft evaluation process, and make the decision whether to return based on the feedback.
The Hawks finished 11-19 overall, 5-13 in A-10 games. Away from Hawk Hill, St. Joe’s was 2-12 (1-10 away; 1-2 neutral). No. 12 seed La Salle (11-18, 5-13) will play No. 5 seed St. Louis (21-10, 12-6) in the second round on Thursday at 2:30 p.m.