Philly Basketball 24 • 7 • 365

City of Basketball Love

Current Section

Home

La Salle battles Davidson, loses at the buzzer

03/13/2015, 10:00am EDT

By Garrett Miley

Garrett Miley (@GWMiley)
--

BROOKLYN, N.Y.--Jerrell Wright lifted up his Rec Specs and crouched at the free throw line, sighing.

Atlantic 10 Player of the Year Tyler Kalinosky proved his mightiness and broke La Salle’s hearts at the buzzer. Kalinosky took a dribble handoff to the basket and bounced it off the rim and through the net as time expired for La Salle and its season.

Davidson overcame an 18-point La Salle lead in the first half and knocked off the Explorers, 67-66, in the quarterfinals of the A-10 Tournament.

Kalinoski finished with 18 points and four assists for the Wildcats.

“I made a move, saw the lane open, saw the shot‐blocker coming over and I knew I just had to get it high enough to get over him and give it a chance to go in,” he said. “And luckily for us it did.”

La Salle head coach John Giannini froze by the scorer’s table near mid-court.

“I was surprised that shot went in,” he said. “I thought that we had them out of rhythm a little bit and it looked like the ball was thrown towards the rim and not shot as well as they normally do–and it just kind of took a couple bounces and went in.”

For a moment it looked like La Salle was going to become the fourth team in the last four years to upset the top seed in the quarterfinals. For a moment, it looked like Steve Zack hadn’t played his last game as an Explorer yet. And maybe, just maybe he’d saved the best for last.

The 6-foot-11 senior big man was the focal point of the La Salle offense and scored a career-high 24 points on 11-for-17 shooting while corralling 15 rebounds in 40 minutes of court time.

Zack had a double-double by halftime and exploited the size mismatch that Davidson’s Jordan Barham, just 6-foot-4, offered.

“Me and Steve knew that we can get the ball inside and score over their bigs,” Wright said. “So the first half, we just want to just be aggressive and look for each other down low.”

The Explorers went to Zack and Wright early and often as the frontcourt duo scored the first 18 of La Salle’s points against Davidson, and Zack’s personal 18 first half points led La Salle to a nine point halftime advantage. A lead that was once as large as 18 with 6:52 before the intermission.

But then Davidson woke up.

Guard Brian Sullivan connected on consecutive corner three pointers to end the half and pulled top seeded Davidson within nine of La Salle. The momentum had shifted to Bob McKillop’s team. Davidson came out of the locker room in the second half picking up right where they had left off at the intermission buzzer.

“We always think about coming out second half as momentum,” Davidson’s Jack Gibbs said. “We want to get the momentum of the game switch to our end. We had not had it for much of the first half.”

The Wildcats were denying Zack and Wright inside, attempting to cover up their glaring matchup problems and their defense, which allowed 46 points in the first half, began to buckle down.

La Salle went without a point for the final 4:45 of regulation, shooting 0-for-6 from the floor during that span.

Jordan Price, on the heels of a 28 point outing in a win over UMass yesterday, was just 1-for-8 from the floor against Davidson. He found himself in foul trouble that lingered throughout the game and was never able to establish a rhythm within the offense.

And despite the loss, the trio of La Salle seniors (Zack, Wright, and D.J. Peterson) combined for 54 of La Salle’s 66 points and 29 of La Salle’s 41 rebounds.

“Our seniors were absolutely amazing,” Giannini said. “The stats show that. Your eyes could have seen it. They played with incredible effort and pride and togetherness, and they displayed everything that a coach appreciates and admires.”

And while the Explorers won the overall rebounding battle, 41-30, Davidson had the edge on offensive rebounds resulting in extra possessions. One in particular that loomed large in the scheme of the game.

With 1:23 left in regulation, Kalinoski made a layup and drew a foul to bring Davidson within four of La Salle, pending the free throw. Kalinoski missed the shot from the line, but Barham secured the offensive rebound leading to a 3-pointer by Gibbs in the corner to pull Davidson within just one point with 1:19 remaining.

Gibbs finished with a team-high 22 points and five three’s for Davidson which, as a team, made 14 3-pointers compared to just 10 two-point field goals.

Davidson moves on to the A-10 semifinal and gets the winner of VCU-Richmond at 1:30 P.M. tomorrow. The game will be shown on CBS Sports Network.