City of Basketball Love

Josh Verlin (@jmverlin)
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Mountain MacGillivray knows there’s going to be some ugly nights. That’s the nature of La Salle’s roster this year, stuffed full of new pieces, most of whom hadn’t played a lick of Division I hoops. 

Such was the case on a late Thursday afternoon at Tom Gola Arena. The Explorer women were all out of sorts on the offensive end, stymied by a visiting Maine squad, which survived La Salle’s full-court press to come out 58-48 victors. 

La Salle (1-1) was just 18-of-61 (29.5%) from the floor, got out-rebounded by 18 (50-32), gave up 19 offensive rebounds, missed layups by the handful. It was close early, but Maine started making shots in the second half, and La Salle went even colder. 

“Obviously that was not a great performance,” MacGillivray said afterwards. “We made some good things happen, but you’ve got to make shots and you’ve got to rebound the ball.

“But the beauty with a young team, it’s just another opportunity to get better and grow,” he added. “We’re going to watch the film, we’re going to learn from this, going to break it down in practice and keep moving forward with it.”

Mountain MacGillivray (above, right) talks to his players before a substitution on Thursday afternoon. (Photo: Josh Verlin/CoBL)

There’s a line between playing fast and wild, a line MacGillivray’s Explorers seem to toe on every possession. His rotation goes 12 deep, full-line rotations coming in every few minutes, the idea to play as fast as possible, but that can lead to some poor decisions on the offensive end.

After turning it over 32 times in their season opener at Coppin State — while forcing just 12 giveaways — La Salle was slightly more composed against Maine, giving it up just 16 times against Maine, only six in the second half. But much of it was their own doing. Too many possessions saw an Explorer drive into traffic and throw a pass into triple coverage, or get trapped in a bad position off a baseline drive.

“Our issue is not the pace — we didn’t play fast enough tonight,” MacGillivray said. “The issue was us understanding our spacing, which will be an issue early with a young team. That part, the half-court part that was choppy and ugly, that’s the way it’s going to be a little bit until we all get comfortable.”

Those offensive woes really caught up with the Explorers in the second half. Trailing by three midway through the third quarter, La Salle went over eight minutes without a point, Maine slowly expanding the lead to 12 a couple minutes into the fourth. 

The Black Bears (1-1), who lost to Quinnipiac in their opener, were led by 20 points from Anne Simon and a 12-point, 15-rebound effort from reigning America East Player of the Year Adrianna Smith. 

By the time La Salle broke a 12-minute streak without a bucket, the deficit had reached 16 with under four minutes to play. Afterwards, MacGillivray wasn’t quite sure why his team struggled so much offensively, needing to take a deeper look before he could help his team adjust in their next few practices.

“They were backed off just a little bit, hands high, it was a little uncomfortable shooting, but we couldn’t beat them on penetration, create easy shots,” he said. “Maybe a little length on the perimeter bothered us, I’m not really sure. When I watch the film I’ll have some more answers. We certainly didn’t make a lot of shots.” 

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Macktoon off to solid start

Two games into the season, La Salle seems to have found something in freshman wing Aryss Macktoon. The St. Timothy’s (Md.) product came off the bench for a team-high 17 points in Monday night’s win at Coppin State, then followed that up with 13 against Maine, the only Explorer in double figures; nobody else had more than seven points. 

Long and bouncy, the 5-10 wing was at her most productive attacking the bucket in transition, able to get up and over defenders’ reach; she also hit a little one-handed pull-up/floater in the lane, going 6-of-14 from the floor.

“When I come into the game, I’m thinking to keep the energy up, and if it’s down, try to raise the energy,” she said.

“She plays hard every time she gets on the floor,” MacGillivray said. “It’s hard to keep her from getting to the basket, hard to keep her off the boards, and then when you can also shoot the ball from the perimeter and raise over people for her pull-up, it’s difficult [to guard], and she’s taken advantage of those things. We’re tightening up her handle a little bit, and she’ll be even better.”

MacGillivray isn't counting on Macktoon to lead his team in scoring every night. With his deep rotation and a number of different options, he'd rather have a varience, making it more difficult for his team to scout.

“We have a lot of players who can put the ball in the basket, and if it’s going the way I’d like, it’s going to be a different player every night," he said. "It happened to be the same player two nights in a row, which is fine, too.