City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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Saint Joseph’s entered the season with a boatload of optimism under third-year head coach Billy Lange, a few notable additions teaming with plenty of holdover talent leading to the hope that the Hawks would turn the corner and start trending upwards from the program’s nadir of the last couple years. 

Tuesday night, Maryland-Eastern Shore looked ready to pour a big bucket of cold water all over Lange’s Hawks, before Taylor Funk saved the day. 

The fifth-year senior out of Manheim Central’s 3-pointer from the left wing with seven seconds left saved St. Joe’s from what would have been a worrying defeat, the hosts escaping with a 69-67 win to open up their year. 

If Lange was upset about the margin or method of victory, however, he didn’t show it afterwards.

“That’s basketball: two teams play, one wins, one loses,” he said, adding a minute later, “there’s probably an expectation of how we should have won, but that’s not for us, we have to continue to compete.

There were mistakes aplenty for St. Joe’s, from turnovers (16 total) — quite a few of which were unforced — and missed open shots to perhaps the biggest brain freeze of all, allowing UMES’ Da’Shawn Phillip to leak out for a wide-open layup that made it a 67-64 game in UMES’ favor with 25 seconds to play.

Jordan Hall brought St. Joe’s within a point on a layup with 15 seconds to play before the Hawks forced a turnover on the ensuing inbounds, retaining possession with 13.6 seconds left on the clock. 

That’s when Funk stepped up and knocked down his sixth triple of the day.The 6-foot-8 forward inbounded the ball off the baseline, fighting off a screen to escape to the corner, where Hall found him with just enough space to let loose.

With fans in the gym for the first time in over 610 days, it was a great time for a buzzer-beater, unleashing 1,600 happy voices inside Hagan Arena at the end of the men's/women's doubleheader.

“We didn’t run that the whole game,” Funk said. “Edge [forward Ejike Obinna] set a great screen, and they didn’t switch it — and if would have switched it, I think Edge would have had an open dunk. Great call by Coach.”

“We repped that every day, so I knew he was going to get open to the corner,” Hall said. “I knew if I got him the ball in the pocket he was going to knock it down.”

Funk finished with a game-high 22 points on 8-of-13 shooting, including 6-of-11 from downtown. He’s coming off a career-best year where he averaged better than 17 ppg, and picked up right where he left off, knocking down a couple early 3-pointers and only slowing down briefly in the second half, as UMES made its big push.

Hall (above), the talented Neumann-Goretti product who flirted with both a transfer and the NBA this offseason after a standout freshman year on Hawk Hill, finished with 11 points and 11 assists, coming one rebound short of a triple-double. It wasn’t the best shooting game for the 6-9 guard, who was 5-of-15 from the floor and 1-of-6 from 3-point range, but the Hawks need the uber-talented sophomore on the court to play at their best.

“I didn’t know I was one rebound away from a triple-double, I didn’t think I played that (good) of a game,” he said. “I don’t really go out there looking for (triple-doubles), I just really let the game come to me...that’s kind of my game, the assists, the rebounds, and that’s how my game flows into it.”

Hall and Funk, the Hawks’ top two players for most of last season while Ryan Daly was out with an injury, are two big reasons St. Joe’s has eyes on taking a big step forward 6-26 (2-16 Atlantic 10) and 5-15 (3-9) in the first two years of the Lange regime. 

For the four newcomers on the roster, all expected to play major roles, the season opener was a mixed bag. Obinna, the Vanderbilt transfer who started at center, finished with 13 points and six rebounds, playing physical inside, though he also missed a few looks from in close. His backup, 7-footer East Carolina transfer Charles Coleman, had two points on 1-5 shooting.

The two freshmen in the starting lineup, 6-8 wing forward Kacper Klaczek and 6-2 guard Erik Reynolds II, both had quiet nights; Klaczek was 1-of-3 for three points and three rebounds in 19 minutes, while Reynolds was 1-of-6 for four points, with two rebounds and two assists in 22 minutes.

Maryland-Eastern Shore, which participates in the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference (MEAC), missed all of last season due to COVID after going just 5-27 (4-12) the year prior, when they didn’t come within single-digits of any of their 14 Division I non-conference opponents. 

The visitors looked like they wouldn’t be much of a matchup for St. Joe’s out of the gate in this one, falling behind 34-15 within the game’s first 14 minutes. But Jason Crafton’s Hawks had it within single digits within the first five minutes of the second half, taking the lead for the first time with 12:24 to play. 

St. Joe’s and UMES traded leads from that point onwards, Eastern Shore going up by its largest advantage at 62-58 with 2:25 to play on a 3-pointer by Zion Styles. A response triple by Hall and layup by Obinna helped the Hawks hang in for the wild ending.

“I’ve been a part of these games before, so you just keep your team in the moment and I think they stayed in the moment,” Lange said. “Getting the jump ball at the end, getting the steal at the end, getting the deflection, the execution underneath, I couldn’t be more proud of our guys.”

Octorara and Harcum College product Dom London had 11 points on 4-7 shooting (2-5 3PT) to lead UMES, which had nine different players in the scoring column. They’ll play at Temple at 7 PM Wednesday night, Nov. 10, in the Owls’ season opener.

St. Joe’s has a slightly longer rest, hosting Mt. St. Mary’s (0-1) on Saturday at 1 PM.