City of Basketball Love

Andrew O’Connor (@andrewoconnor23)
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On nights when shots are not falling for both sides, the goal is to play aggressive and get to the line and St. Joseph’s showed this in Wednesday’s 78-70 win over Massachusetts.

And the Hawks have done it all season.

“I think that we play more aggressively, we play more at the basket,” coach Phil Martelli said after the win.

The Hawks attempted 40 free throws throughout the course of the night, 23 more than the Minutemen, and converted 29 of them making up a significant chunk of their scoring.

Saint Joe’s averages 23.1 free throws per game and converts 16.3 of them, roughly 71 percent. Tonight they got to the line 17 more times, but converted at a very similar rate of 72 percent.

This Hawk aggression really began in the second half where they shot 29 of their 40 free throws.

“The first half was disappointing,” said Martelli. “We were playing sideways and 12 of our 32 shots are threes. That’s not a good formula for us.”

Aggressive drives and looking for contact appeared to be the formula that worked as entering the second half the Hawks were trailing by one point, but their lead grew as high as 12 in the final 20 minutes.

“It’s not our shooting, but our scoring jumps off the page because we’re getting some layups,” said Martelli, “James [Demery], DeAndre [Bembry] usually get some layups and we get to the foul line.”

Inside scoring, as well as the foul line, has been St. Joe’s bread and butter as over the past two games the outside shot has not been falling as they’ve shot an atrocious 22 percent (8-for-36).

Meanwhile, the Minutemen’s leading scorer, senior guard Trey Davis, was limited to 10 points (4-for-12 FG) in 25 minutes of play due to foul trouble. The limited play from Davis was huge for the Hawks as he had just come off back-to-back 30 point outings including a 36-point game against St. Louis on Saturday.

It’s a two pronged attack from the Hawks because as they force you to foul them, they are not making the same mistakes as frequently on the other end. On average, the Hawks shoot eight more free throws than their opponents. They more than doubled that discrepancy Wednesday night.

Leading the Hawks in their free throw barrage was senior forward Isaiah Miles. Miles had 27 points, with nine of those points coming from the line, and also pulled down 12 boards to grant him his seventh double-double of the season.

“We’re staying aggressive. We have a lot of aggressive guys on this team and a lot of guys who are hard to contain -- James, Shavar -- guys who are hard to stay in front of,” said Miles, “So when they go by, they go to the rim, their shots are hard to block, so they’re going to draw fouls.”

Miles can be especially aggressive because while the team may be shooting 70.4 percent from the line this season, entering Wednesday, he was shooting 90.4 percent from the line which was good for fourth in the nation in free throw percentage.