City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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It’s been a rough few years for Drexel basketball since the 2011-12 team barely missed out on an at-large NCAA spot despite winning 27 pre-tourney games (29 including two NIT victories). The Dragons went 46-76 (.377) over the next four years, which resulted in head coach James “Bruiser” Flint’s firing at the end of a six-win 2015-16 season.

Replacing the 15-year head coach was former Army boss Zach Spiker, who came into Philadelphia with a tough task ahead of him to not just rebuild the Dragons, but turn a roster full of players recruited to play in Flint’s grind-it-out style and try to fit them into his more run-and-gun attack. But the late arrival of two talented freshmen certainly brought some new energy to University City, and the first year of Spiker’s tenure has to be considered a step forward.

Here’s a complete breakdown of Drexel’s 2016-17 season and a look at what’s to come:

In a Nutshell…

With expectations about as low as possible, Drexel didn’t exactly shock the city with its play early on, but the Dragons certainly looked more energetic and were more fun to watch than they were the year prior. For the third year in a row, a true freshman started at point guard, and Kurk Lee Jr. proved to be plenty ready to handle major minutes at the Division I level -- as did classmate Kari Jonsson, an Icelandic native who adjusted rather quickly to the American game.

And though senior Rodney Williams enjoyed a career year, junior Sammy Mojica saw a significant bump in his numbers and one veteran on the team made his long-awaited return from injury, that wasn’t enough to save Drexel from a last-place finish in the Colonial Athletic Association regular-season, two games behind a Delaware program going through a similar reset. James Madison didn’t let Drexel get comfortable at the league tournament in Charleston, knocking out the Dragons in the first round.

The Good…

After last year’s starting point guard, Terrell Allen (13.1 ppg, 2.1 apg), departed for Central Florida following Flint’s firing, there was a hole in the point guard spot that nobody on the roster was really meant to fill. But Spiker managed to bring in another DMV-area product, and Lee -- the 5-foot-8 son of the former Towson dynamo -- looks like he’ll be running point the next three years. Lee averaged 14.9 ppg, 5.0 apg and 3.9 rpg, good for 10th in the CAA in scoring, fourth in assists and third in steals (1.6/game). On top of that, he knocked down 40 percent of his 3-pointers (4th in the CAA). The top 3-point shooter in the league was another Drexel freshman, Jonsson, who hit 43.6 percent (65-of-149) from beyond the arc. The 6-3 guard from from Hafnarfjordur, Iceland (rolls right off the tongue) looks more like the lead singer of a pop band with his brown hair swept across his forehead, but there’s no doubt that he’s a big-time player when he takes the floor, something that was proven when he was named First Team at the U-20 Euros before coming to Drexel and then confirmed during the course of his freshman season.

After three years of flashing promise but lacking consistency, Williams put it all together in his senior season. The 6-7 forward from Richmond (Va.) averaged a career-best 15.6 ppg, grabbing 6.8 rpg as well, a number that was just below his sophomore season (8.2 ppg, 7.0 rpg). An offense that was designed more around letting the skilled post player get to work helped him up his field goal percentage from 45.7 percent last year to 52.6 percent this season, making him a far more efficient threat.

The best “feel-good” story of the Dragons was certainly the return to the court of redshirt junior guard Major Canady. The Kiski School (Pa.) product had missed each of the last two season with major injuries, and though he suffered a setback to his torn ACL just before the season, he returned by December and ultimately played 190 minutes spread over 21 games (1.4 ppg, 1.4 apg).

The Bad…

When it came to close contests, the Dragons had some problems, going 3-11 in games decided by ten points or fewer. That was especially evident down the stretch, when they lost 10 of their final 11 games -- six of which were within single digits. Quite a few of these were well within Drexel’s grasp, like a 79-77 loss to Hofstra on Feb. 4 (up nine with four minutes left) and a 69-65 home loss to Towson on Feb. 11 (up one with under three minutes left). At some point, a program that hasn’t done a lot of winning the last few years has to recover the formula to reverse those types of decisions. When they did win this year, it was handily: only three wins were within 10 points, and the average margin of victory was 15.

In his first season of eligibility with Drexel, former St. Joe’s Prep star Miles Overton struggled for long stretches initially, though he was finding his game more and more before a wrist injury cost him the final eight games of the year. Ultimately, the 6-foot-3 wing guard’s shooting numbers (28.4 percent overall, 25.2 percent from 3) need to come way up, especially with a couple of guard transfers waiting with hopes of playing big minutes next year; next year will be his final one of college eligibility, however, and there are plenty of guys who have broken out given that last opportunity.

The Ugly…
If there was one thing that former head coach Bruiser Flint prided his Drexel teams on, it was defense -- the Dragons were in the top 100 in defensive efficiency in every season from 2005-06 to 2011-12, including three years in the top 25, according to KenPom. But this year was by far the worst of the 15 seasons on KenPom, as Drexel gave up 1.10 points per possession, which was 283rd in Division I basketball. Even though the offense was an improvement from last year (.984 to 1.03 ppp), it wasn’t equalled by the drop in the Dragons’ ability to get any stops.

Not sure if it’s a good thing or a bad thing, but there wasn’t one area that really hurt them on the defensive end. They weren’t great at forcing opponents into tough shots, giving up an effective FG% of 53.1 (292nd nationally). They weren’t great at forcing turnovers (17.4 percent of possessions, 247th), grabbing defensive rebounds (69.5 percent, 235th) or getting blocks (8.0 percent, 219th).

Notable Numbers…

3: Drexel’s number of conference wins in each of the last two years. The Dragons improved their overall win total by three wins, from six in 2015-16 to nine this year, but fell from ninth to last place in the CAA as Delaware improved its league win total by three wins of its own, to get to five this year. Drexel hasn’t had a winning season in league play since 2011-12 (29-7, 16-2), going .500 in the CAA in the three years afterwards.

.697: The Dragons will return nearly 70 percent of their scoring next year, losing Williams' team-high average but returning the next five leading scorers. Add in the production of Harper and Isabel's respective sophomore seasons, and Drexel has just about as many points back in its lineup this year as it did from last, a good sign for any program.

.345: Drexel shot 34.5 percent from beyond the 3-point arc this season, which represented an improvement over the previous four seasons; the only time Drexel shot better from the arc in any season since 2004-05 was in 2011-12, when they made 37.8 percent from deep. Spiker's teams traditionally have relied heavily on the long ball; only 36.6 percent of Drexel's shot attempts this year were 3-pointers, but his Army squads came very near (or above) 40 percent with regularity.

Senior Sendoff…

Four players on this year’s roster have used up their final year of eligibility and won’t be returning, including one walk-on. Rodney Williams will certainly leave the biggest hole in the rotation, as he takes with him 1,158 points, 687 rebounds, 128 blocks and 125 assists; it’ll be up to junior Austin Williams (7.1 ppg, 6.3 rpg) to step up in his senior year. The other four-year Dragon who’s departing is Mohamed Bah, a 6-9 center who started most of his sophomore year but was largely a role player in his career, averaging 4.3 ppg and 3.7 rpg in 12.5 mpg as a senior.

After four years as a walk-on at Richmond, John Moran made the most of his one year at Drexel, averaging 2.8 ppg in 31 games off the bench. The 6-3 guard out of Malvern Prep and then the Hill School was a reliable bench option for Spiker as a backup point guard, and lent a veteran voice to a team that needed some guidance as well. The final senior to depart also was only on the roster for one year: former manager Elgin Ford, Jr., who walked on this season and saw action in five games.

Future Outlook: Improving

It’s going to take another few seasons to really see what Spiker is capable of doing with Drexel, but the potential is in place for them to take a bit of a bump up the CAA standings next year. Lee and Jonsson are a nice backcourt pair, but now they’ll need to add pieces around them; the incoming crop this fall looks promising, but a strong 2018 haul is crucial.

Four new faces will suit up in Drexel uniforms for the first time in the fall. Transfers Tramaine Isabell (Missouri) and Troy Harper (Campbell) join freshmen Timmy Perry Jr. (Phelps School, Pa.) and Jarvis Doles (Mt. Zion Prep, Md.), and all four have a chance to make an impact; certainly the two transfers, who will both be redshirt juniors in the fall, will fight for big minutes right away. Harper, a bouncy 6-2 combo guard and Neumann-Goretti grad, averaged 13.5 ppg, 3.3 rpg and 1.4 apg as a sophomore at Campbell; Isabell, a stocky 6-0 point guard, averaged 6.2 ppg and 1.7 rpg as a reserve in his last season as a Tiger. The rookies add height, as Doles is 6-8 and Perry -- whose father Tim Perry played at Temple and went on to a 13-year pro career that included eight years in the NBA -- is a promising prospect at 6-9.