City of Basketball Love

Austin Petolillo (@AustinPSports)
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Drexel trailed for a total of 30 minutes and 43 seconds in their game against Lafayette on Wednesday night, but what mattered the most was on top when the clock hit zero.

After being down by as double figures in the second half, Drexel got the better of Lafayette, finishing off the comeback in the final minute of a 68-67 win.

Trailing by one after Lafayette’s Justin Jaworski put the Leopards up 67-66 with 31 seconds remaining, Drexel’s Austin Williams came up big.

After a missed 3-pointer by Drexel guard Tramaine Isabell went long, fellow guard Sammy Mojica found himself with the ball in his hands and quickly dished it out to Isabell on the perimeter. Isabell then found an open Williams for the go-ahead slam to put the Dragons up 68-67 with 13 seconds to go.

“I felt like once Sammy got the offensive rebound, everyone was kind of scrambling,” Isabell said. “I saw Lafayette trying to find their man and there was an open lane to give Austin the ball, so we want to get that every single time we can.”

As Jaworski was quickly trying to move the ball down the floor, Williams came from behind to swat the shot out of bounds with five seconds remaining. The Leopards couldn’t connect on a final shot at the buzzer.

“The big play was Sammy getting that rebound and then passing it to Tramaine and then him dishing it to me for the finish,” Williams said. “I know we just scored, we had to get a stop...I love blocking shots.”

Drexel had four guys finish in double figures. Isabell led the Dragons with 19 points and eight rebounds, Williams finished with a double-double, scoring 15 points and hauling in 10 rebounds. Mojica finished the game with 10 points and sophomore transfer Alihan Demir scored 12 points and grabbed six rebounds.  

This win snapped a three-game losing streak by the Dragons (3-4).

After trailing by 11 with more than 15 minutes remaining, Drexel kept chipping away at the lead. But thanks to three unanswered triples that came between the 14:58 mark and the 13:38 mark of the second half, two of which came from senior guard Sammy Mojica, all of a sudden, they were down two points within a two minute span.  

I thought (Sammy) got us going in the second half,” Drexel head coach Zach Spiker said.
“He hit a couple shots and we fed off that and got moving.”

Had it not been for their poor shooting in the first half, Drexel might have won the game without having to do so in dramatic fashion.

Going 1-of-12 (8.0 percent) from e-point range, the Dragons looked worse than usual, not great for a team that averages 32 percent on 3-point shooting to begin with.

“They slowed us down with their zone,” Isabell said. “We were getting good looks and they just weren’t falling down, but at the end of the day it worked out in our favor.”

But after going 6-of-19 from beyond the arc in the second half, those improved numbers led to the comeback victory for Drexel.

“I think some of the looks were a little cleaner in the second half,” Spiker said. “We’ve got some good 3-point shooters; if we go 1-for-12, I’m not going to say stop shooting.”

While the offense was a little sluggish, the defense came to play for Drexel.

The Dragons forced Lafayette to turn the ball over 15 times, including eight times in the first half.

“Our program will be as successful as our defense is,” Spiker said. “We’ve been able to guard things differently, we make adjustments but the more we throw at our guys and the more they can absorb and take and put into practice, it makes us a better team.”

“We just locked in because earlier in the game we were making silly mistakes so everybody just played perfect defense.” Williams said.

For the first time all season, Drexel had more assists (11) than turnovers (9).

Lafayette was led by a 24 point effort from Jaworski and a 17 point game from senior forward Matt Klinewski.

Drexel has been hampered with injuries all season long and their lack of depth showed with Isabell playing the entire 40 minutes of gameplay, sophomore guard Kurk Lee played 39 minutes, and Mojica played 37 minutes.

Senior guard Miles Overton has missed all but one game this season due to a calf injury, sophomore wing Sam Green injured his knee last week and junior guard Troy Harper is out with a shoulder injury.

It is unclear how much more time Overton and Green will miss due to their injuries but Harper will be sidelined for a few more weeks and should be good to go by the time conference play begins.

“These are great wins and these are great games,” Spiker said, “but they’re all setting us up to be better on both ends of the floor when it comes time for league play.”