Hofstra 93, UNC Wilmington 64 (Or: A little touchup and a little paint…)

Only 11 more chances to figure out the theme of the post-game recaps, Loyal Reader Missy, err, everyone!

Referee Sean Casady sidled up to Mo Cassara as the Flying Dutchmen produced their most dominant CAA victory in more than two years and asked the question on the minds of most of the 3,017 fans at Hofstra Arena.

“He said ‘Where has this been all year?’” Cassara said after the Dutchmen routed UNC Wilmington, 93-64, in the regular season finale Saturday.

Cassara and his players have believed they were capable of a performance like this throughout an exasperating, luckless season in which the effort never waned even as the Dutchmen suffered narrow loss after narrow loss. It all finally came together in a rollicking Senior Day victory fueled by the three departing Dutchmen.

CAA scoring champion Mike Moore had 30 points and Nathaniel Lester remained among the top 10 scorers in the league with 20 points to lead five Dutchmen in double figures. But the most impressive performance was authored by the third senior, Dwan McMillan, who racked up an incredible 15 assists—the most in the CAA this season and one shy of the Hofstra single-game record, set way back by Robbie Weingard in the 1983-84 season—to surge past VCU’s Darius Theus and win the CAA’s assist title.

“We had as many close games as anybody in the league, if not in the country this year, [and] didn’t come out on the right end of a lot of them,” Cassara said. “But tonight I thought our energy was great, our effort was great and our attitude was great. And that’s a credit to these three guys. Their stats throughout the course of the game were really incredible.”

As a team, the Dutchmen put up some pretty incredible—and borderline historical—stats. The Dutchmen tied a team record, set way back in the 1988-89 season, with 25 assists. The Dutchmen shot 56.6 percent, their best effort since the season opener against Long Island, and drained a season-high 12 3-pointers. Defensively, the Dutchmen enjoyed a 39-possession stretch in which they didn’t allow UNC Wilmington to score on consecutive trips up the floor.

The Dutchmen led by as many as 37 with a little more than two minutes to play prior to a game-ending 13-4 run by the Seahawks and were on pace for their first 100-point effort against a Division I opponent in almost exactly 20 years until Cassara took the air out of the ball down the stretch(cough, would never happen if Jaime Larranaga coached here, cough cough).

The 29-point victory was still the program’s biggest margin of victory over a Division I opponent since a 93-54 win over UNC Wilmington Jan. 27, 2010, the game that infamously got Benny Moss Benny Mossed. And the lopsided win cut the Dutchmen’s overall point differential this season by more than half (from 54 points to 25 points) and made them just one of two CAA teams to win at least two games by 25 points this season.

“We were clicking on the offensive end and defensive end,” Lester said. “Not a bad time to start.”

We won’t know until late Friday night whether the win was the start of something big—or at least a run to Sunday or Monday in the CAA Tournament—or merely a fluke outburst against the worst defensive team in the CAA. But the Dutchmen certainly displayed some elements of a winning team against the Seahawks.

The Dutchmen got off to their usual fast start (taking a 9-0 lead, during which UNC Wilmington coach Buzz Peterson subbed out his entire starting lineup) before, as usual, quickly allowing the opponent back into the contest. But after falling behind 14-11, the Dutchmen outscored the Seahawks 34-11 to end the first half and remained ruthless and unrelenting in the second half.

The Dutchmen improved to 8-9 when three or more players score in double digits (Stevie Mejia, Stephen Nwaukoni and Shemiye McLendon all scored 10 points each). The dual point guard combination of McMillan and Mejia continued to create opportunities on both ends of the floor: In addition to combining for 19 assists, they sparked a defense that recorded eight steals (the 10th time in 11 games they’ve had at least seven thefts) and forced more turnovers than the Dutchmen committed for the 10th straight game.

“I think this small lineup has helped us a lot,” Cassara said. “I think the pressure we’ve been able to put [on teams], like last Saturday on Siena and for the most part William & Mary until the very end of the game and then today, we’ve been able to wear some teams down. So we have to try to continue to do that.”

Nwaukoni had a double-double (10 points and 10 rebounds) and mostly neutralized UNC Wilmington big man Keith Rendleman. Moussa Kone fouled out in just 17 minutes of play, but hit both of his field goal attempts, including a sweet 10-foot bank shot in the first half, as well as both of his free throws. He’s 5-for-5 from the field in the last two games and 4-of-5 from the free throw line in the last four games after beginning the season by hitting just 10 of his first 28 attempts.

“I thought [Nwaukoni] did a great job defensively,” Cassara said. “I think you saw his strength. Rendleman is a terrific player and our whole team did a great job on him, doubling him in the post and frustrating him.”

The odds are this frustrating season for the Dutchmen won’t have a Hollywood ending (as we’ll get into all week long with the annual Just The Facts, coming soon to a screen near you!) and that extending the program’s Senior Day winning streak to 16 games will stand as the highlight of the most challenging campaign in 17 years. But the rout at least created some momentum for the Dutchmen heading into Friday night’s opening round game against Georgia State and provided a glimpse at what this team can do when things are clicking.

“Better late than never—it’s a start,” Moore said. “This gives us a lot of momentum going in and a lot of confidence for the guys whose shots haven’t been falling.”

“We’ve really been having great practices the last two weeks,” McMillan said. “Some of the games we haven’t closed out, but I think we can make some noise.”

3 STARS OF THE GAME (vs. UNC Wilmington, 2/25)

3: Dwan McMillan

2: Mike Moore

1: Nathaniel Lester

SEASON STANDINGS

Mike Moore 64

Nathaniel Lester 45

Dwan McMillan 20

Stevie Mejia 15

David Imes 14

Stephen Nwaukoni 10

Shemiye McLendon 9

Moussa Kone 6

Bryant Crowder 2

Matt Grogan 1

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

Hofstra 71, UNC Wilmington 64 (Or: On Senior Night, a sophomore shall lead the way)

Before David Imes took over, Charles Jenkins and Chad Tomko did their best Bird vs. Jordan imitation (sans, thankfully, Jordan's hideous sweater, my goodness, the early '90s were a fashion train wreck says the guy who wore acid-washed jeans and a mullet, where am I going with this?)

I’ve been bogged down with end-of-the-month mortgage—err, rent—paying work and trying to finish up the last of the Senior Day profiles in time for Senior Day, all at the same time, so the UNC Wilmington recap is a bit later than I would prefer and once again of the bullet point variety. Hmm. I smell a trend here. Anyway, enjoy!

1.) The most important result of the Flying Dutchmen’s 71-64 win over UNC Wilmington actually happened a few hundred miles to the northwest, where VCU fell to Drexel 64-60. The Rams’ loss gave the Dutchmen sole possession of third place (actually, for a night, the Dutchmen were alone in second place until Old Dominion beat James Madison to regain second on the tiebreaker) and ensured that the Dutchmen will lock up the three seed by beating Delaware. That’s a huge accomplishment, both in the micro and macro sense: Finishing third allows the Dutchmen to avoid George Mason until the championship game and would mark the best finish for the program since 2006-07—a remarkable feat given all the turmoil the Dutchmen endured last spring and the leanness of the roster.

“I just think it’s a real credit to our staff—Steve and Wayne and Allen and Kyle [Steinway] and our Gas and managers and everybody,” Mo Cassara said from Wilmington afterward. “Just an incredible job, day in and day out throughout the season. It’s a real credit to them, a real credit to our team that we’ve been able to bounce back from some disappointing losses and some tough road trips and ultimately find a way to win. To be 7-2 [on the road] in the CAA is really an incredible achievement.”

2.) While Charles Jenkins embarked on a classic duel with Chad Tomko in the first half and finished with his usual huge game (22 points on 9-of-14 shooting with five assists, four turnovers, three rebounds and one steal), the difference between victory and defeat was David Imes, who made me look like I know what I’m talking about by producing his sixth double-double (which is the exact same amount Halil Kanacevic had last season—just saying). Imes, who made no secret on Twitter of how disappointed he was with the lopsided loss to Wright State Saturday, tied a career high with 17 rebounds and added 12 points and was particularly dominant in the second half, when he had 12 rebounds (including four offensive) and nine points on 2-of-3 shooting from the field and 5-of-6 from the free throw line. As has become his custom, he hit one of the biggest shots of the second half with a jumper that ended a 12-4 run by UNC Wilmington, broke a 59-59 tie and gave the Dutchmen the lead for good with 3:05 to play.

“I challenged him at halftime a little bit,” Cassara said. “I think the thing I’m most proud of with David Imes is not that he got 17 rebounds and made some big baskets. It’s that he missed some shots and had a couple bad plays, but he didn’t get down. He bounced back. I think early in the season, he would have gotten down and [he would have] had to sub him out. Now he’s found a way to fight through that. That’s a real sign of his development. I’m really proud of his development, that’s the thing that [has] really helped us in some games.”

3.) Another sophomore, Yves Jules, played a quietly pivotal role in the victory by helping to shut down Tomko after the latter’s huge first half (14 points on 5-of-8 shooting). Tomko had just seven points on 3-of-8 shooting in the second half, during which Jules played 10 minutes. Jules also hit a 3-pointer from the left corner to break a 56-56 tie with 4:09 to play. His effort was particularly impressive considering he left in the first half with a seemingly serious foot injury.

“Yves gave us some great energy off the bench, some great size on top of Tomko and really gave us some good effort on defense,” Cassara said.

4.) Jules’ contributions were particularly pivotal because Mike Moore (20 points on 5-of-13 shooting, including 2-of-5 from 3-point land, and an 8-of-10 outing from the free throw line) had another quiet game from long distance (though his 3-pointer as the shot clock dwindled with 1:53 to play extended the Dutchmen’s lead to five) while Brad Kelleher was just 1-of-6 from beyond the arc and slumping freshman Shemiye McLendon drew his first DNP-CD of the season. Cassara played sophomore walk-on Matt Grogan, who missed a 3-pointer in four first half minutes, over McLendon.

“I’m a little bit of a big picture guy and I think that sometimes I go with my gut and my feeling on what’s going to help this team win and make this team better,” Cassara said. “It was just a feeling I had, Matt’s really been working hard in practice and it’s just a decision I made within the team.”

5.) Imes’ big second half symbolized a more spirited effort by the Dutchmen, who were getting outhustled to most of the “50/50” loose balls in the first half by a Seahawks team feeding off the momentum of Senior Night. But the Dutchmen, who held only a pair of brief one-point leads in the first half before entering intermission tied for the first time this season, never trailed in the second half despite falling into a tie three times.

“Part of it is a credit to UNC Wilmington, I think they just played really hard, they had great energy and they were quick to the ball [in the first half],” Cassara said. “Ultimately we found a way to keep the game close at halftime and make some big plays down the stretch at the end of the first half to keep it close. They came out with good energy in the second half, got a little bit of a lead and found a way to finish it off.”

The win once again showed the resiliency of the Dutchmen, who are now 5-2 in the game immediately following a double-digit defeat. “Coming off a really tough BracketBuster game, a tough trip out to Ohio, come home, really have to get after it for a couple days in practice and then get on an airplane again to come all the way down to Carolina—I was worried if we didn’t win tonight it would have been a couple tough losses in a row coming home,” Cassara said. “Ultimately we found a way to have a great energy tonight. Overall not our best performance but really a great effort and I’m really proud of our team.”

3 STARS OF THE GAME (vs. UNC Wilmington, 2/23)

3: David Imes

2: Charles Jenkins

1: Mike Moore

SEASON STANDINGS

Charles Jenkins 74

Mike Moore 37

Greg Washington 25

David Imes 19

Brad Kelleher 7

Shemiye McLendon 5

Dwan McMillan 5

Yves Jules 1

Stephen Nwaukoni 1

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

Hofstra 87, UNC Wilmington 70 (Or: With Corny channeling Craig, anything seems possible)

Three-time NBA 3-Point Shootout champion (and former head coach of one-time ECC rival Chicago State) Craig Hodges has nothing on Life With Corny!

One of the most compelling storylines of the season for the Flying Dutchmen has been Cornelius Vines’ attempt to morph from a reckless and emotional free shooter to a more careful and defensively minded player whose first instinct on offense is to get his teammates involved.

It’s a transformation, though, not a lobotomization, and so the old Life With Corny we all came to know and appreciate last season is always bubbling just beneath the surface. Nobody knows this better than Tom Pecora, who deviated from his usual script of trying to rein Vines in by encouraging him Friday to wax nostalgic against UNC Wilmington Saturday night.

“I was kidding around with Vines at practice,” Pecora said Saturday night. “I looked at his stats, I think he had 72 threes last year and he had [34] this year. So I said ‘You owe us 40 3-pointers.’”

Vines did his best to make up the deficit in one night, especially during a 63-second span midway through the second half Saturday in which he did his best Craig Hodges impersonation (click this link, kiddies, it is a PERFECT analogy for this particular Saturday night!) and draining three consecutive 3-pointers to single-handedly steal the momentum from UNC Wilmington and allow the Dutchmen to begin pulling away from the Seahawks in an 87-70 victory.

Vines’ first 3-pointer came immediately after Johnny Wolf’s 3-pointer pulled UNC Wilmington within 52-48, the closest it had been since the nine-minute mark of the first half, and began (in at least one Long Island living room, anyway) conjuring up images of this season’s second half collapses by the Dutchmen. His second 3-pointer gave the Dutchmen a double-digit lead for good and his third 3-pointer forced the Seahawks to call a timeout.

Vines finished with a school record-tying seven 3-pointers and a career- and game-high 24 points while also adding six rebounds, one shy of his career high, and three assists.

Hoisting plenty of 3-pointers is routine even for the “new” Vines, who is averaging 5.7 3-point attempts per game this season, down from seven a year ago. But draining them like he did Saturday? Not quite: He had one more 3-pointer Saturday than in his previous seven games combined and drained fewer than three 3-pointers in 21 of his first 25 games overall.

“Right after the game he says ‘I owe you 33, I’ve got to get working on it,’” Pecora said. “Obviously, I don’t expect seven a night. But it was the separation we needed. It changed the whole game.”

And, maybe, the whole season. Vines’ performance was the highlight of perhaps the best performance this year by the Dutchmen’s five veterans, who combined to score all but two of the team’s 48 points in the second half (Yves Jules dunked for the final basket with 1:49 left) as the Dutchmen survived an epidemic of foul trouble.

Greg Washington picked up his fourth foul less than four minutes into the second half while Miklos Szabo, Chaz Williams and Halil Kanacevic all had four fouls with five minutes to play. But Charles Jenkins made up for a subpar shooting night (6-for-15) by driving the lane regularly and hitting all nine of his second half free throws. Szabo had seven points and seven rebounds in the second half after recording just two of each in the first half while Nathaniel Lester finally re-appeared in scoring six points and pulling down five boards in the second half on his way to his first double-digit scoring performance since Jan. 2.

The five veterans combined for 76 points, by far their most in a single game this year and 87 percent of the Dutchmen’s total—tied for the largest percentage in a win with the

“First thing I said in the locker room was ‘The seniors,’” Pecora said. “They keep playing like this, we’ll win this whole thing.”

(Editor’s Note: He’s starting to sound like me)

As usual, this red-hot run by the Dutchmen needs to be viewed with a bit of caution. Sure, they’ve won five of six—all by at least 10 points—since bottoming out against Drexel Jan. 23, have all but clinched the seventh seed in the CAA Tournament and are already assured of being only the second CAA team since 2001-02 to post a winning record in the second half of the conference season after going 2-7 or worse in the first half.

Yet four of those five wins have come against three of the five teams that are within a game of the CAA basement: UNCW Wilmington (twice), Delaware and James Madison.

But…there was that Signature Win Wednesday over Drexel, and the Dutchmen’s last two road wins over James Madison and UNC Wilmington marks the first time the program has won consecutive CAA road games by at least 17 points.

“You go on the road and you win by 20 at Madison and 17 tonight—that doesn’t happen on the road,” Pecora said. “You’ve really got to be playing [well] to do that. It doesn’t matter who you’re playing. So I’m pleased with that. And obviously it’s got to continue at Delaware and then at Northeastern.”

The Dutchmen also displayed on Saturday a combination of crispness, cohesiveness and aggressiveness not seen all season. They had nine dunks, which may in fact be more than they had combined in the first 25 games. Washington, who is typically the world’s tallest jump shooter, scored all five of his baskets on dunks, including three in the first three minutes of the game.

Washington’s last dunk in that sequence gave the Dutchmen a lead they’d never relinquish. And the Dutchmen dominated UNCW Wilmington down low, recording more than twice as many defensive rebounds (28) as the Seahawks had offensive boards (13) and leading interim coach Brooks Lee to declare Hofstra was “…probably the most physical team that we’ve played all year.”

“Everyone, for the most part, played well,” Pecora said. “Greg Washington was tremendous, especially the first 10 minutes of the game. Until he got into foul trouble, he was electric, playing with energy and aggressiveness. Miklos Szabo made some big-time plays, could have had a double-double. And Lester did a good job off the bench.

“No matter who we called on—Dave Imes gave us good minutes when he was in [in the first half]—did his job. From top to bottom, it was a good team win.”

It was also the type of win that embodied the bipolar basketball the Dutchmen have played the last couple years and inspired some optimism that maybe even better days are ahead. Six weeks ago today, we were all wondering how the Dutchmen would respond to squandering an opportunity to beat nationally renowned William & Mary at home. Three weeks ago today, we were all declaring this season a disaster and merely hoping the Dutchmen had hit rock bottom.

Now? With a clearly defined seven-man rotation, an actual bench at Pecora’s disposal and the oft-criticized veterans leading a Dutchmen resurgence, who knows what we’ll be thinking three weeks from today, when the CAA championship game takes place?

“We were banged up through that stretch where we couldn’t win—they were trying just to compete,” Pecora said. “If you look at what happened in the league tonight, VCU lost to Madison and William & Mary lost to Northeastern. I really think this could be a tournament where whoever is playing well rolling into the tournament would have a legitimate chance. Hopefully we’ll have that.”

3 STARS OF THE GAME (vs. UNCW, 2/13)

3: Cornelius Vines

2: Charles Jenkins

1: Miklos Szabo

SEASON STANDINGS

Charles Jenkins 51

Chaz Williams 26

Miklos Szabo 21

Halil Kanacevic 20

Nathaniel Lester 18

Greg Washington 13

Cornelius Vines 12

Yves Jules 1

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

Hofstra 93, UNC Wilmington 54 (Or: Nothing’s gonna stop us now!)

The party begins as the usual sellout crowd at Hofstra Arena reacts to the Flying Dutchmen ending their five-game losing streak last night. (Aurimas Kieza and Carlos Rivera showed up too, in uniform, in hopes of changing the Dutchmen's fortunes!)

On a night filled with images that were previously unimaginable to even the most loyal and optimistic Flying Dutchmen fan, this one was the most gloriously incongruous of all: Cornelius Vines—his confidence now restored and sporting an ear-to-ear grin—jumping on the back of a similarly smiling Greg Washington and riding him all the way into the locker room shortly after the final buzzer.

It was the most symbolic image, as well, after Washington put the Dutchmen on his back and had the night of his life in leading the Dutchmen to a historic 93-54 rout of UNC Wilmington that snapped a five-game losing streak.

We interrupt this blog for a special message for those in the audience who give the rest of Mason Nation a bad name: Anyone who looks at the box score and figures the Dutchmen were piling on probably shouldn’t be logging on to the computer without adult assistance.

If Tom Pecora wanted to, the Dutchmen could have won this game by 59 points (that could never happen!). But they began draining the shot clock early in the second half and took their last 3-point attempt with 9:25 to go. Chaz Williams had a fast break opportunity with about 14 minutes left and slowed down to burn clock, earning a warm ovation from a Hofstra crowd that knows class when it sees it, and particularly when it doesn’t.

Charles Jenkins was out of the game before the eight-minute media timeout. Washington played a career-high 38 minutes but took his last shot with 12:54 left. The Dutchmen’s last nine shots were taken over a span of almost nine minutes and hoisted entirely by freshmen or reserves. Sometimes, one team is just 39 points better than the other, and that was the case Wednesday. We now return you to your regularly scheduled blog.

Vines (who had 15 points, six assists and six rebounds and was so relaxed in the second half that he slapped Pecora on the back on his way down the court), Washington and the rest of their teammates weren’t the only ones riding the wave of euphoria. An overflow crowd stormed the court, where grown men wept and strangers hugged.

The party eventually made its way to Hempstead Turnpike, where the scene made Bourbon Street Sunday night look like Main Street in Hampton Bays circa Christmas Eve. Honking cars were tipped over, fires raged and the mob broke into Shuart Stadium and carried out the goalposts, because, well, let’s face it, they are of no use there anymore.

And really, can you blame Dutch Nation (snort) for such an over-the-top celebration? The world last night is far different than the one we inhabited the last time the Dutchmen won Jan. 6. Back then, Massachusetts was still represented by two Democrats in the U.S. Senate. The Indianapolis Colts were on a two-game losing streak and the New Orleans Saints were on a three-game losing streak. America was spending money it didn’t have on a wretched looking flick called Avatar.

Look at the world now. With such unpredictability around us, is it any wonder we embrace something that reminds us of simpler times?

Of course, ironically—in that it’s not ironic at all—last night was reminiscent of just about nothing at all we’ve ever seen out of a Hofstra basketball team.

The Dutchmen scored a stunning 54 points in the first half, more than they’ve scored in four games alone this season and the most points the program has scored in the first half in the Pecora Era. The 93 points were the most the Dutchmen have scored in regulation since putting up 98 against James Madison Feb. 24, 2007 (when they scored a Pecora Era-record 56 points in the second half) and the most they’ve scored in regulation at home since racking up 98 against William & Mary Jan. 24, 2004.

Four days after they trailed Drexel by 30 points in the second half of a loss in Philadelphia, the Dutchmen led by as many as 32 in the first half and by as many as 42 in the second half on their way to the program’s most lopsided win since a 39-point victory over Northeastern Jan. 4, 2000.

“We were kidding around in practice and we just said ‘Look, we’re due. Eventually the ball’s going to start going in for us,’” Pecora said. “And if we get back to guarding and rebounding, we’ll be OK. So obviously I was very pleased with it. I thought it was a team win.”

Jenkins scored eight of his game-high 24 points on a single play a little more than halfway through the first half. That is not a misprint. Jenkins was intentionally fouled by Jeremy Basnight as he went in for a fast break layup. He hit the basket and the two free throws. UNC Wilmington coach Benny Moss argued the call and was tagged with a technical foul and Jenkins hit those two free throws. And then Jenkins scored on the subsequent possession.

The eight-point play capped a 23-4 run for the Dutchmen, extended their lead to 34-9 and officially buried the Seahawks. “That was all coach—coach let me shoot the free throws,” said Jenkins, who looked as if he was smiling for the first time in three weeks.

“Good thing you made the first two,” Pecora said. “I would have pulled your ass right off that line.”

The Dutchmen had five players score in double figures for the first time in almost four years (since the win over George Mason Feb. 23, 2006), and Nathaniel Lester finished with nine points and missed two shots at making it a historic six players with at least 10 points: Lester missed a free throw with 5:18 left and a layup as the shot clock wound down in the final minute.

In that game against Mason, the five double-digit scorers accounted for every Dutchmen point. Last night, they received 15 points from the other four players to appear in the game.

“I was very pleased it was distributed the way it was,” Pecora said. “That’s good for a lot of reasons. It obviously gives us some balance, but it also makes the feel good spread out. If it was a game where one or two guys got 30 and 40, I don’t know if our confidence would rise as much as it will now by us sharing the wealth and by us playing unselfish and by a number of guys feeling good about themselves coming out of this game.”

Nobody felt or looked any better than Washington, whose disappearance the last several weeks coincided with the Dutchmen’s fade. But he was brilliant from the opening tip Wednesday as he scored the Dutchmen’s first two baskets and exceeded his season average entering the game by scoring six points in the first 2:33. Washington went on to almost post the first triple-double in school history with 14 points, a record-tying 10 blocks and eight rebounds.

Washington’s effort on defense sparked a resurgent performance by the Dutchmen, who allowed just one Seahawks player to reach double digits after allowing an opponent to reach a career-high in points in three of the previous four games. The Dutchmen pulled down 30 defensive rebounds and outrebounded UNC Wilmington 41-30.

“The past five losses, I haven’t been shooting the ball well,” Washington said. “And it feels good when you’re making shots. Once you make the first show, you’re going to want to keep going and going. It helps [him on the] defensive end. It gets the team going and motivated.”

It was the first time Washington has scored in double figures since Nov. 24, a span of 15 games, and the first time he’s pulled down at least eight boards since recording a season-high 13 rebounds against Florida Atlantic Dec. 29, a span of eight games.

“Gregory’s the key to everything we do,” Pecora said. “He was laying out in the lounge before the game today and I popped my head in and I just said ‘What do you say? Let’s play like the old days here, like you were playing early in the year and late last year.’

“He needs to be that active. And now it’s a matter of doing it all the time. We have to be consistent. We have to play at a high level the rest of the way.”

Of course, some of the enthusiasm generated Wednesday must be tempered. This is the same UNC Wilmington that won three CAA titles last decade—tied for the most with VCU—in name only. The Seahawks are 2-13 on the road in CAA play the last two years, during which it has suffered the program’s eight most lopsided conference losses.

In terms of the Dutchmen’s standing in the CAA, all Wednesday did was solidify their status as the best of the conference’s Bowl Subdivision teams (major props to UNC Wilmington beat writer Brian Mull for that gem). But for a team whose confidence was shaken—if not shattered—by the five-game losing streak, the rout was the greatest tonic possible.

“I backed off them the last few days and I just said ‘Hey guys’—these two guys [Jenkins and Washington] and Mikey and Corn and Nat—‘take ownership,’” Pecora said. “And I let them know they could play a little bit and give them a little bit more confidence. I think they lost their confidence, and I was surprised by that. But it just goes to show you that you can play a game on Saturday where you’re down 30 in the second half and four days later play a game when you’re up 30 in the second half. So that’s how crazy college basketball can be.”

3 STARS OF THE GAME (vs. UNCW, 1/27)

3: Greg Washington

2: Charles Jenkins

1: Cornelius Vines

SEASON STANDINGS

Charles Jenkins 39

Chaz Williams 21

Halil Kanacevic 18

Nathaniel Lester 18

Miklos Szabo 15

Greg Washington 11

Cornelius Vines 9

Yves Jules 1

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com or follow Defiantly Dutch at http://twitter.com/defiantlydutch.

Hofstra 79, UNC-Wilmington 66 (Or: Deep Impact)

Tea Leoni is going to break the story of the giant comet on its way to destroy Earth, but not before she watches the Flying Dutchmen beat UNC-Wilmington Friday.

The Flying Dutchmen opened the season in mid-November with what looked like the deepest roster of the Tom Pecora Era. But nobody could have imagined just how correct that assumption would prove to be at the most opportune time possible.

Four Dutchmen starters played 13 minutes or less, but reserves Greg Washington, Dane Johnson, Cornelius Vines and Zygis Sestokas combined for 37 points and 29 rebounds and Charles Jenkins had another monster game as the Dutchmen never trailed in beating UNC-Wilmington, 79-66, to advance to the CAA quarterfinals today against Old Dominion.

The Dutchmen managed to record their most lopsided win of the conference season—and their most lopsided victory since a 68-52 win over St. Francis on Dec. 13—on an afternoon in which Pecora was forced to juggle his rotation before the first media timeout. Nathaniel Lester and Darren Townes each picked up two fouls in the first three minutes and played just seven and 10 minutes, respectively, while Greg Johnson (nine minutes) and Arminas Urbutis (13 minutes) were also limited.

Lester, who still managed to score 10 points, made by far his briefest appearance in his 13 games as a starter while Townes tied his low mark in minutes in the 13 starts since returning to the lineup Jan. 17. Johnson played his fewest minutes, disregarding the game against James Madison in which he hurt his shoulder, during his streak of 17 straight starts while Urbutis, who was making his 13th straight start, played his second-fewest minutes in that span.

The four starters with 13 or fewer minutes is easily the most since at least the 2004-05 season (more research today). The Dutchmen have had as many as two starters play 13 minutes or fewer only five times in that span (all since the start of last season).

Yet the work of the four reserves helped the Dutchmen produce perhaps their most complete game of the season. Washington and Dane Johnson enjoyed particularly revelatory performances off the bench. Washington recorded his third double-double of the year by scoring a career-high 14 points on 7-of-9 shooting—most of his 15-foot jumpers hit nothing but net—and tying a career high with 12 rebounds in a career-high 33 minutes

Johnson, whose indecision with the ball down low has led to an increasingly marginal role, played the type of game that no doubt had fans and his coaches alike wondering just where the hell this has been all year. All three of Johnson’s baskets were ferocious dunks and he pulled down seven rebounds in 23 minutes, his highest totals in both categories since Jan. 10.

Vines and Sestokas combined to shoot just 4-of-16 from beyond the arc, yet Life of Corny played 33 minutes, his most since he was demoted to the bench following the loss to Drexel Jan. 14, and his suffocating defense on Chad Tomko resulted in a miserable shooting night (2-for-14) for the Wilmington star. Sestokas tied a season-high with five rebounds in 33 minutes the fourth tie in the last five games he’s exceeded 30 minutes—a mark he didn’t reach at all in 44 consecutive games between last Jan. 5 and Feb. 14.

Jenkins, meanwhile, got plenty of work, in playing 40 minutes for the fifth time and scoring 27 points—on 9-of-16 shooting from the field and 8-of-8 shooting from the free throw line—to go along with nine assists and four rebounds. That Jenkins didn’t sit once in a game the Dutchmen led by at least two possessions over the last 32 minutes was the source of some concern at the CAA Zone boards.

But while the Dutchmen were never threatened after a 17-4 run gave them a 16-point lead a little more than 12 minutes into the game, they could never really put away a pesky Wilmington squad Pecora called the best 12 seed he’s ever seen. The Seahawks didn’t get within single digits over the final 16:11, yet they made six of 10 3-pointers in the second half to keep things just interesting enough that Pecora could not empty the bench.

Plus, why mess with what was just about the perfect momentum builder going into what could be the game of the tournament? The Dutchmen returned to their usual defensive tenacity (they out-rebounded Wilmington 43-30 and limited the Seahawks to just 31.6 percent shooting form the field) while shooting 52.7 percent, their second-best effort of the season. Multiple players supported Jenkins on offense and fellow sophomores Lester and Washington played like future anchors of the program.

A similar performance will be needed today in what could be the game of the tournament against a red-hot Old Dominion team that is, in many ways, a mirror image of the Dutchmen. Washington and Dane Johnson, in particular, will need to be as effective in limiting the impact of ODU’s 6-foot-10 star Gerald Lee and the experienced. And another good start is essential. It says here that the Dutchmen will be playing Sunday as long as they’re within a couple baskets by midway through the first half today.

The collective effort Friday was reminiscent of the one generated in a home victory over Towson Feb. 7, when the Dutchmen eked out a 71-68 win despite nobody getting as many as 30 minutes of playing time. That win marked the start of a four-game conference winning streak. The Dutchmen would be quite content if history began repeating itself Friday.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com. And join the Defiantly Dutch group at Facebook today!

Hofstra 88, UNC-Wilmington 81 (Or: Blame it on the blogger)

It's your fault Tom Pecora couldn't feel good about the Flying Dutchmen getting to 20 wins on Charles Jenkins' 20th birthday!!

This is, as usual, all my fault.

Midway through the first half Saturday, with the Flying Dutchmen lighting it up against UNC-Wilmington and already enjoying a double-digit lead, I declared the game over, that the Dutchmen would never trail again.

That, of course, was not the case, even though the Dutchmen didn’t fall behind until overtime (note to self: find out just how rare that is). Declaring lopsided victory so early displayed a sadly lacking understanding of the Dutchmen-Wilmington rivalry: This is the fourth straight year the Dutchmen and the Seahawks have played an overtime game and the seventh straight year in which the Dutchmen-Seahawks game in Hempstead either went into overtime or was settled by six or fewer points.

And after Charles Jenkins finished off what had to be the greatest performance ever by a Hofstra player on his birthday (major props to the Lions Den for not only serenading Jenkins but also presenting him with a birthday cake that he carefully carried off the court) by scoring six of the Dutchmen’s final eight points to turn potential disaster into exasperated relief and an 88-81 win (that’s the Daily News recap, here’s the Newsday recap), I stood up and said to the wife “Well, I’m glad we don’t have to worry about NC-Wilmington next week.”

We got home several hours later (aha! I bet you thought I’d be one of those stark raving lunatics who would be watching a scoreboard all night! You would be wrong! Though Hofstra and the CAA was all I was thinking about as I tried to be social with a substandard of species that does not obsess over Hofstra and the CAA), called up the CAA scoreboard and saw ODU beat Northeastern and William & Mary beat Drexel.

Those were the two upsets that I thought Hofstra needed to finish fourth…but I sucked at algebra in high school so I screwed up that equation. ODU win + W&M win / Hofstra win equals the five seed and a Friday game against…12th-seeded UNC-Wilmington. Damn you algebra!

And damn my prescience! When I said following the Dutchmen's 80-78 win over the Seahawks in Wilmington that UNC-Wilmington would be someone’s nightmare matchup on the Friday of the tournament, I expected the Seahawks would be, you know, someone ELSE’S nightmare. (And damn you too, Drexel, but more on that and the rematch against Wilmington in the next post.)

As for the regular season finale: It proved be a nice summation of the entire bipolar campaign. The Dutchmen started out great (a 17-4 run turned a tie game into a 25-12 lead less than 11 minutes into the game) and then they weren’t great (UNC-Wilmington subsequently went on a 14-4 run). Then they were great again (a 15-6 run to open the second half and give the Dutchmen a 14-point lead). Then they weren’t great again (the Seahawks outscored the Dutchmen 20-10 over the final 5:46 of regulation to force overtime)

In overtime, the Dutchmen stepped to the edge of the abyss in falling behind twice and twice giving the Seahawks a chance to take a two-possession lead before Jenkins took over. Jenkins’ effort looked as brilliant (a career-high 35 points on 11-of-18 shooting, eight assists, five steals, four rebounds and one block) as it did painful (he went crashing to the hardwood and had to be helped up three times in the final seven minutes of regulation).

He was augmented nicely by one-time wingman Cornelius Vines, who scored 17 points—his most since he scored 23 against Delaware Jan. 7—on 5-of-11 shooting from 3-point land and unwittingly inspired the funniest line of the season. I’m watching the MSG broadcast as I write this and analyst Frank Sullivan just said the following of Vines (well, he didn’t JUST say it, it’s almost 3 a.m. Monday and he said this…ahh you know what I mean): “Very quietly, Cornelius Vines, too, in a very unassuming way, has had an impact offensively on this game.”

I’m pretty sure that’s the first time ever the words “very unassuming way” have ever been used in an adjectival way with Vines. Life of Corny was his usual hilariously entertaining self Saturday: Celebrating after every 3-pointer, dancing his way back to the bench every time the Dutchmen headed into a timeout with momentum and continually waving his arms in the direction of the student section.

Moments after the post-game handshake concluded, who was the first Dutchmen player to dive into the stands? Not a senior but our man Corny. This guy’s Senior Day next year is going to be epic. I think he’s going to pull a Cal Ripken Jr. and run around the Arena, slapping hands. That ceremony better start six hours prior to first tip.

Anyway, where was I? Oh yes.

The Dutchmen enjoyed a huge height advantage over the Seahawks yet the two teams ended up tied with 40 rebounds. And overtime was necessary because the Dutchmen continued their paradoxical existence: A team that has enough of a killer instinct to lead the nation with 12 wins by five points or less also has a devil of a time putting teams away.

The bipolarity extends to the brand of basketball the Dutchmen are suddenly playing. The Dutchmen have given up 67 points in regulation in a season-high three straight conference games, a statistic unbecoming of a squad that leads the CAA in field goal percentage against. Is it just a hiccup, a matter of playing run-and-gun James Madison and Wilmington and running into a red-hot team in Georgia State, or a sign the Dutchmen are getting away from their stingily successful style?

The Dutchmen also remain similarly uncertain on offense. They’ve shot 40 percent or better in five straight games, tying a season high set between Nov. 16 and Dec. 6. Is this a sustainable shift or just a matter of the recent opposition (the Dutchmen have recorded four of their five best shooting games in conference against James Madison and UNC-Wilmington)?

In addition, the Jenkins-Nathaniel Lester combination seemed to be established when they ranked first and second on the Dutchmen in four straight wins following the George Mason debacle, but Lester has scored just 12 points in the last three games as Vines (twice) and Greg Washington have stepped up as the second-leading scorer.

What’s it all mean? Damned if we know. It seems odd, yet also appropriate, to be wondering about consistency 30 games and 16 weekends into the season. One thing appears certain: We’ll know what the last few games symbolized come the conclusion of the only weekend of the season that matters.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com. And join the Defiantly Dutch group at Facebook today!

Hofstra 80, UNC-Wilmington 78 (Or: I don’t believe what I just saw)

Sure, he hit one of the most memorable home runs in baseball history. But did Kirk Gibson ever pluck an air ball out of the, uhh, air and lay it up and in to win a game at the buzzer?

Hope you listened to Litos (or, more accurately, read and absorbed his words) Monday when he wrote the following: “The JMU/Hofstra game is exactly why you pay for the video feed of CAA games.”

Dude is clairvoyant. I shall now call him Dion Warwick. His gifts are being wasted on us. He should be penning predictions for the National Enquirer. I miss those predictions of my youth. Some buffoon whose claim to fame in 1984 was predicting re-election for Ronald Reagan predicting silly crap for 1985 like “Michael Jackson will announce he’s retiring from music, only to return in December as the lead singer of Motley Crue, which will record the soundtrack to Breakin’ 3: Heavy Metal Boogaloo.”

Anyway, if you didn’t pay the $4.95 for UNC-Wilmington’s webcast last night, your loss. (Oh, and a little birdie tells me that the Hofstra website will soon undergo an overhaul that will allow it to offer webcasts. I’m going to believe that my words yesterday inspired the school to take action. That’s my story and I’m sticking with it.)

I like to think I’ll be able to do justice to how the Flying Dutchmen turned a potentially gut-wrenching defeat into a holy crap moment and an 80-78 victory. But really…you should have been there, watching a webcast—good quality as far as those things go, but still nowhere near as crisp as watching it in HD, or even on our plain ol’ TV—whose inherent fuzziness added an additional surreal, is-this-really-happening vibe to the festivities.

As UNCW prepared to inbound the ball with 13 seconds left in a tie game, you should have been sitting there, in my dad’s recliner in an otherwise silent house, thinking to yourself how often you’ve wished for a steal in a situation like this and how rarely it happens.

Then you should have seen the Dutchmen swarm Chad “much better than my distant relative Brett” Tomko as time ticked away. Cornelius Vines and Nathaniel Lester surrounding Tomko near the left sideline, no timeouts for the Seahawks, nowhere to go for Tomko…maybe this could happen.

And then it did. Someone—Tony Dennison—swipes the ball and begins streaking towards the opposite basket. With no clock visible on the webcast and no idea how much time was left—what is this, soccer?—you should have been there, imploring Dennison to shoot. But then it looked like he slipped—or did he collide with Tomko? That’s right, the final sequence was so wild even those who had a crystal clear view of things had different views of what happened—and there’s Dennison sitting, a la me right now, and desperately chucking the ball towards the basket.

Air ball. But then there’s a shadowy figure, Arminas Urbutis, appearing out of nowhere, jumping up and putting the ball in and then…buzzer. Holy crap. Eat your heart out, Aurimas Kieza! It was as if this dude’s steal and this dude’s shot and these dudes' shots got together and had a baby.

Even without the dramatic finish (alas, being on a webcast wasn’t enough to land this on SportsCenter’s top 10 plays of the night), you missed one of the most enjoyable and, perhaps, pivotal games of the season. The biggest lead of the game was six (by the Dutchmen midway through the second half) and there were 13 ties and 24 lead changes. The Dutchmen didn’t so much play down to the competition as the Seahawks played up to it. UNCW will be a pretty good team’s nightmare matchup on the first Friday of March.

UNCW, which is only the seventh team this season to exceed 70 points against the Dutchmen, was so pesky Wednesday that Tom Pecora said he ordered his players to be aggressive on the final possession because he feared the Seahawks would win in overtime. That would have been the fourth straight season these teams have played an overtime game…maybe it’ll happen in 30 days. (For a more extensive take on the game, check out this excellent blog entry from UNCW beat writer Brian Mull)

A loss would have looked bad on the resume because a team that harbors hopes of playing deep into the first weekend of March—and beyond—can’t lose to a team seemingly doomed to finish among the bottom quarter of the conference. But the worst part about a loss Wednesday would have been the lack of a tangible reward for an encouraging performance.

It’s unlikely the 80 points—the third-most scored this season by the Dutchmen and only the second time they’ve hit or exceeded 80 points in a victory—are a sign of things to come. After all, everyone scores (must…resist…urge…to…make…cheap…pop…culture…joke) against the Seahawks.

But even with that caveat, there were plenty of positive developments on offense Wednesday. Even though the Seahawks shut him down for the final 12 minutes—during which he made just one of four shots from the field and scored three points—Charles Jenkins had the monster game most of us have been waiting for since the middle of December. Jenkins drained a career-best four 3-pointers in the first half on his way to a career-high 33 points. He also tied a career-high with a team-best three blocks and added five rebounds.

For the third straight game, Dennison stepped up in place of Jenkins in the middle of the second half. Dennison had no points when Jenkins went to the bench with three fouls with 12:10 left, but he scored the Dutchmen’s next six points and finished with 10 points. Dennison has scored 38 points in the last four games—37 in the second half.

Lester made me look almost as prescient as Litos by scoring a season-high 18 points, tying a season-high with three steals and playing 30 minutes without a turnover.

And the winning basket was an appropriate reward for Urbutis, who had a brilliant second half and seems to be emerging as the player most likely to have a Roberto Gittens-esque impact late in his senior season. The undersized Seahawks hustled their way to a 16-12 rebounding advantage in the first half, but Urbutis pulled down nine of his team-high 10 boards in the second half and the Dutchmen ended up outrebounding UNCW 36-31.

The victory was additionally valuable because it allowed the Dutchmen to maintain their grip on fifth place in the CAA. Those who are much better at math than me and compile the various RPIs are very likely skeptical of the Dutchmen’s solid standing, figuring they aren’t as good as their record because their uncannily good record in close games—9-1 now in contests decided by five points or less, and really, they should have beaten Iona to make it 10-0—means the good luck is going to turn sour at some point.

But the more games the Dutchmen win like this—and Wednesday marked the fifth time this year the Dutchmen have won a game in which they trailed in the final minute—the less it is about luck. It’s about toughness—a toughness Hofstra has displayed in the macro sense as well by going 4-0 against the spectrum of the CAA since what could have been a season-ruining rout at the hands of Drexel 15 days ago.

That toughness will come in handy Saturday, when pre-season favorite VCU arrives at the Arena. I’m no psychic, I’ve got a pretty good feeling you’ll get some legitimate bang for your buck if you show up Saturday. At the least, you owe it to Speedy Claxton in his return to The House That He Built. More on that tomorrow.

Email Jerry at defiantlydutch@yahoo.com. And join the Defiantly Dutch group at Facebook today!