City of Basketball Love

David Driver (@DaytonVaDriver)
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WASHINGTON – Jack Clark has picked a great time to play the best basketball of his career.

And the Explorers, after a rough start to conference play, actually have the longest winning streak of any team in the Atlantic 10 Conference.

Clark had 20 points and tied a career high with 13 rebounds as La Salle beat city rival Saint Joseph’s 63-56 in the first game of the Atlantic 10 Conference tournament at Capital One Arena in downtown Washington. In his previous game, the redshirt junior guard had a career-high 30 points at Duquesne.

“It is probably the best basketball I have played in my life,” Clark said. “Honestly it is just confidence from players to managers to the coaches. I am just working every day in practice; it is confidence really.”

He came in averaging 12 points per game this season.

“Honestly, going into today’s game we just wanted to build on the momentum of a three-game winning streak,” Clark added. “Saint Joe’s is a city rival. We just wanted to be prepared.”

“Jack has continued to stay focused on defense and rebounding,” coach Ashley Howard said.

The No. 13 seed Explorers are now 4-2 against Big 5 teams this year with three victories against the Hawks. La Salle will face No. 5 seed Saint Louis on Thursday at 2:30 p.m.

“I am proud of our guys; they battled and withstood a Saint Joe’s run that started at the end of the first half and carried pretty much through the second half,” Howard said. “I thought our defensive effort and intensity was really good. Clif had some really good blocks down the stretch to put the game out of reach.”

The Explorers excelled with the two-man game with Clark and Moore.

“We work on it a lot in practice,” Clark said.

“The big thing is stay aggressive in the two-man,” Moore said.

In a season full of challenges, the Explorers of La Salle had an amazing 11 players start at least one game.

But it was the play of the bench that aided a first-half run.

Josh Nickelberry, a reserve junior guard, made a 3-pointer that gave the Explorers a lead of 33-23 with 8:19 left in the first half.

Freshman guard Khalil Brantley, who also came off the bench, made a layup to build the margin to 39-23 with 2:15 left in the first half.

The Explorers still led 39-27 before the Hawks made a 13-0 run early in the second half.

Saint Joseph’s trimmed the margin to 42-39 on another basket by Charles Coleman, who entered the game averaging just 1.6 points and 9.8 minutes per contest.

Howard is the son of Maurice Howard, who played nearby at the University of Maryland and in the NBA.

“Going into the game we watched our last game against St. Joe’s (when it was) 49-48,” Howard said. “I anticipated St. Joe’s would do another good job on the defensive end and we had to get out in transition. Getting some easy baskets was a point of emphasis for getting ready for St. Joe’s.”

With the loss, the No. 13 Hawks end the season 11-19 overall and 5-14 in conference contests.

Saint Joseph’s was paced by reserve Coleman, who had 10 of his career-high 18 points in the first half. Ejike Obinna had 14 points and Jordan Hall had 11 points for the Hawks, who played a second straight game without standout Taylor Funk (hand) in the matinee in Washington.

“We definitely didn’t plan on that,” Howard said of Coleman. “But you have to make adjustments. When you lose a good player (Funk) like that, someone else has to step up

“So many games we are right there” with close losses, said Billy Lange, the coach of the Hawks.

“I’ve been coaching 27 years; I’ve seen a lot. Every season is a journey, some carry over to the next, some don’t. I do believe we were playing our best basketball in the last three and a half weeks of the season.”

The season-ending loss was the eighth in nine games for St. Joe’s, though five were by six or fewer, and two were in OT.

Coleman hit four of five shots from 3-point range.

“Ultimately, it’s about trying to win the game,” he said of his thought process before the contest. 

The Explorers (11-18) will face a tough Saint Louis team in the quarterfinals.

“Saint Louis is a physical team,” Clark said. “We have to come tomorrow and show them we are more physical than they are.”

Said Howard: “You talk about a Philly Big 5 game – we respect St. Joe’s. We respect those guys. We played them twice and they had us down 15 points both times.”

“Any team that can get down 15, you have to respect them. I thought our guys, their preparation the last couple of days, that is what helped us.”

The Explorers will look for a fifth straight win Thursday.

“If we come out tomorrow and we make shots, then everybody is going to say it was an advantage because you got a chance to play in the arena today before they did,” Howard said.

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Editor’s note: David Driver has covered college basketball in the Washington area for 30 years and can be reached at www.daytondavid.com and @DaytonVaDriver. His book “Hoop Dreams In Europe: Americans Building Basketball Careers Overseas” was published this week and will be available on Amazon later this week.