City of Basketball Love

Joseph Santoliquito (@JSantoliquito)
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PHILADELPHIA — The challenge will be to stay in the present. That’s the way Saint Joseph’s women’s basketball coach Cindy Griffin likes to play it. Take a little nibble of success here, a slice of victory there, and gradually, cobble together a full picture that will come into bloom.

The view looks pretty good right now.

The St. Joe’s women are presently the best-kept story in the city, starting their season 13-1 after the Hawks won their second Atlantic 10 Conference game with an impressive 67-47 victory over visiting George Washington at the Hagan Arena Wednesday night.

This is the best start in Griffin’s 23 years with the Hawks (13-1, 2-0 A-10) and the best start the program has had since 1976-77, when they got out to a 16-1 beginning.

But you get the sense Griffin would like to temper things. A 13-1 record can be intoxicating, though there is history looming that has not been on the Hawks’ side. St. Joe’s women have not won an A-10 regular season title since the 2002-03 season, when the conference was in an East-West two-division format; the conference realigned and went to a one division format in the 2005-06 season.

The Hawks did, however, win the A-10 Tournament during the 2012-13 season, Tasha Cloud’s senior year on Hawk Hill.

The 2023-24 Hawks seem capable of making that kind of run.

Evidence came in spurts over GW (7-7, 0-2). What was a close game at halftime, with the Hawks clinging to a 31-27 lead, turned into a rout when they held GW scoreless for 7 minutes, 16 seconds. What was a 31-30 St. Joe’s lead burst into a 47-30 edge with 2:34 left in the third quarter.

The Hawks were led by the inside presence of Tayla Brugler, who scored a game-high 21, with Laura Ziegler adding 18 and Chloe Welsh chipping in with 16.

The 47 points was the second-lowest amount the Hawks have yielded this season (only behind their 66-45 victory at Yale) and they forced GW into 38-percent (18 of 47) and 21-percent from beyond the arc (3-14), while shooting 50-percent overall (28-56).

“I was very pleased with how our team came out today,” Griffin said. “I thought GW did a nice job of taking us out of our game plan in the first half, but we were relentless about our cuts the second half and even more so, relentless about our defense.

“We had a 21-5 third quarter. Coming out of the locker room the kids responded.”

Griffin felt GW was taking advantage of one-on-one defense, running isolating plays. At halftime, Griffin adjusted with help defense.

Fourteen games in, Griffin is very aware of how her team likes challenges.

“Every challenge that is in front of them, they respond,” she said. “Ultimately, they’re very, very competitive and very relentless and selfless, and tough. I knew that going in, a new year, a new group, and we are now in the Atlantic 10 and we have to be even better in what we’re doing.

“They have experienced that the last couple of years. When you are forced to get into the back half of your offenses, and making plays for each other, and doing at a high success rate, that’s really fun. We keep learning and growing each day.”  

The Hawks will get no breaks. Richmond, which is 12-3 overall and 2-0 in the A-10 after its 72-65 over VCU Wednesday night, visits this Saturday at 2 p.m.

“They’re a very talented team and they shoot the ball very, very well,” Griffin said. “I think it’s a great matchup for us. It’s awesome. A very good team that is very well coached. It’s great. We are going to see where we are early. The fact that we have a lot of teams that are in the top part of our league with wins, it’s great for our league. That’s what we want. We to elevate ourselves, and elevate the teams around us.”

This may be a different Hawks team than the one that suffered its one setback, a 74-48 defeat to nationally ranked Utah back on December 7.

“What’s been fixed since Utah, we didn’t make a whole lot of shots against Utah, so we’re making timely shots and that’s been an improvement,” she said. “Just having a taste of a high-level NCAA Tournament team is all about, and we want to be considered one of those teams. In order for us to be considered, we have to continue to win.”    

Joseph Santoliquito is a hall of fame, award-winning sportswriter based in the Philadelphia area who began writing for CoBL in 2021 and is the president of the Boxing Writers Association of America. He can be followed on Twitter here.