La Salle coasts to easy win over Davidson

CHARLESTON, S.C. - La Salle coach John Giannini wanted to see two good halves of basketball from the Explorers.

He got it, but one probably would have been sufficient.

La Salle rolled to a 16-point halftime lead over Davidson last night and coasted home for an 84-70 victory over the Wildcats in the second round of the Charleston Classic at the Carolina First Center.

"This is clearly our best game of the year because it was our best defensive game," Giannini said. "We did our best job talking on defense, we did our best job getting back in transition. We did our best job not getting beat in one-on-one situations. Then we had a pretty good offensive performance because we shared the ball, we didn't turn it over, we made shots."

The Explorers (2-1) will play Tulane at 12:30 p.m. tomorrow in their final game of the tourney.Rodney Green scored 21 points to go with 10 rebounds and four assists. Also in double figures were Yves Mekongo Mbala (17), Aaric Murray (14) and Kimmani Barrett (13).

"We like to think we have a deep team and that certainly showed up statistically tonight," Giannini said.

La Salle had matched South Carolina basket-for-basket in the first half of Thursday night's opening round. The Explorers went to the locker room trailing by two, only to see the Gamecocks pull away to a 20-point lead in the second half.

La Salle (2-1) led Davidson 46-30 at halftime, thanks in large part to 59.4 percent shooting from the field, including 5-for-9 from three-point range.

But the Explorers went to the locker room ever wary of what could happen in the second half.

Leading by 16 points against the Wildcats, Giannini admitted to being a little nervous.

"I tell you, it's uncomfortable sometimes having a double-digit lead against such a good three-point shooting team," he said. "For us to not let it slip below double digits against a team of that caliber is something I feel good about."

Davidson managed to cut the lead to 11 early in the second half, but Green took over and the Explorers surged to a 19-point lead.

"I was trying to get what the defense gave me, that's all," Green said. "We played great as a team. After last night, we just tried to come out and correct things and that's what we did. We just did what the coaches drew up. We played like a great team tonight."

The remainder of the game was uneventful, although the Explorers slowed the pace somewhat in the closing minutes.

"Davidson likes to play fast and we like to play fast, so I think this was a comfortable game for both teams in terms of tempo," Giannini said. "Of course, when it gets down to around 4 minutes, you don't want to shoot it that quickly, so we kind of backed off." *