By Sean Kennedy
Yesterday’s Action
Northern Iowa 65, La Salle 50
Looking to finish off their Paradise Jam tournament run on a high note, the Explorers were done in by both some putrid shooting and an illness in their loss to Northern Iowa. The linchpin of an already struggling La Salle defense, Jerrell Wright didn’t start with flu-like symptoms, and was limited to just 6 minutes of action. Steve Zack performed admirably in his absence, recording a double-double with team-highs in points (13) and rebounds (13), but didn’t get much help on the interior. The largest evidence of that was the performance of The Panthers’ Nate Buss off the bench, who was a monster with career-highs in both points (23) and rebounds (12).
In spite of everything, the Explorers were within two three minutes into the second half, but a 12-0 Northern Iowa run put the game out of reach. The two lead guards for La Salle had yet another terrible shooting night, with Tyrone Garland and Tyreek Duren combining for just 13 points on 5-24 shooting. Those two really need to get things on track if La Salle is ever going to turn things around this season. They’ll have some time to work it out as following the Paradise Jam tournament, La Salle has over a week off before playing again December 4th.
Today’s Action
Pennsylvania (1-3, 0-0 Ivy) vs. Niagara (1-4, 0-0 MAAC)
Following a promising start to the season, the Quakers were torched by a pair of Big Ten opponents in Penn State and Iowa. They’ll look to get things back on track Tuesday night at home against the Purple Eagles (note: Purple Eagles do not actually exist in nature; don’t go off into the woods in search of a violet bird of prey). Niagara opts to go with a perimeter attack, starting only one player above 6’5″, and play at the 4th-fastest pace in all of college basketball. The result of that fast pace is plenty of scoring, much of those buckets coming from Niagara star Antoine Mason, who is the NCAA scoring leader this season, averaging 31.2 ppg. Mason isn’t an exceptional outside shooter, shooting 29.0% behind the arc this season after just 31.5% a year ago, but he earns a lot of his points by attacking the basket and getting to the foul line. The 6’3″ guard is top-10 in the nation at getting to the charity stripe.
Defending Mason without fouling will be the key to victory for the Quakers, as they should have no trouble on the offensive end given their size advantage over Niagara. Penn already knocked off a MAAC foe this year in Monmouth, and with the Palestra crowd behind them, look for the Quakers to put the Purple Eagles on the endangered species list.
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