By AARON BRACY
Big5Hoops.com
March 1, 2024
PHILADELPHIA – Inside Drexel’s locker room hangs a sign that reads:
Sometimes you, sometimes me, always us
What a beautiful message and a perfect one for this Dragons men’s basketball team. Coach Zach Spiker’s club put on another display of balanced basketball in Thursday night’s workmanlike 90-86 victory over gritty, physical Stony Brook at the DAC. The win clinched an all-important top-four seed and double-bye in next weekend’s Coastal Athletic Conference tournament.
The Dragons (19-11 overall, 12-5 CAA) have one regular-season game remaining, against Northeastern at 4 p.m., on Saturday at the DAC. Drexel will earn the No. 2 seed with a victory and a Hofstra loss, No. 3 with a win and a Hofstra win or a No. 4 with a defeat. It doesn’t really matter whether it’s Nos. 2, 3 or 4 because every quarterfinal game is going to be challenging in the good and competitive CAA — though riding into the conference tournament after a victory certainly would help with confidence.
Getting a double-bye in any tournament is advantageous, and especially in the CAA, where the separation between the top eight teams in the 14-team league is thin.
Spiker is thrilled to have earned the double-bye but knows there still is plenty of work ahead for the Dragons – beginning with Saturday’s regular-season finale in which Drexel can reach 20 victories, a milestone for any program.
“It’s a big deal,” Spiker said of the double-bye. “You just look at percentages. We took care of one of the initial things you have to do to have success in the tournament. But we have another game Saturday. We just want to go ‘One and O.’ That’s been our goal all season. We’re thankful we’ve earned and deserve the right to play three, but we have some work to do and have a really good team coming in here on Saturday.”
Northeastern (12-18, 7-10) is going to have to play much better than its record to have a chance of knocking off the Dragons. So is Drexel’s quarterfinal opponent in Washington, D.C., next Sunday. And as long as the Dragons keep playing, be it in the CAA tournament or the NCAA tournament should they earn the league’s automatic bid and return to the Big Dance for the second time in four seasons, the team across from them is going to have to be good, tough, deep and smart to defeat Drexel.
The Dragons are that good. The thing that continues to impress me about Drexel is its balance. Perhaps the toughest thing about Spiker’s job this season is trying to delve out minutes. Eleven players saw court time against Stony Brook, with nine finding the scoring column.
You want balance and depth? Check this out.
The Dragons trailed 52-46 with 14:46 left before going on a game-changing 14-0 run that featured five different scorers and looked like this: Kobe Magee 3-pointer, Luke House 3-pointer, Justin Moore 3-pointer, Mate Okros 3-pointer, Amari Williams follow dunk.
The spurt put the Dragons in full command. They made a few mistakes at the end, but House’s perfect 4-for-4 performance from the free-throw line in crunch time secured the victory.
Moore, the Dragons’ on-court leader and the most underrated player in the city, was phenomenal with 25 points, 6 assists and 4 rebounds that looked like a typical Jameer Nelson stat line during Saint Joseph’s magical 2003-04 season. (Yes, this a shameless plug for my book project on that team! #0304stjoesbook) Amari Williams, an interior force at 6-foot-10 and the CAA’s Preseason Player of the Year, had 16 points, 8 rebounds and 2 blocks; House scored 15; Okros netted 11; MaGee finished with 9; and right on down the list.
Depth, talent, balance. If somebody is having an off night, there’s another guy, or two, or three, or four, or more with this Dragons team, right there to bail him out. It’s why the Dragons are going to be a tough out for anyone from here until they turn in their uniforms.
“It’s a luxury, to be honest,” Moore said. “We can beat you in different ways. One night it might be one person, another night another person. We have a variety of ways to beat you. And with any team that’s what you need to be successful. You’re going to need that when you want to make a deep run in March. You’re going to need different guys to fill in and make shots. And that’s what we did tonight. And that’s what we do every night.”
Moore plays with a steady, quiet confidence. He carried that demeanor into the postgame press conference. I asked him about Drexel’s chances in the CAA tournament, and he couldn’t have answered it more perfectly – not providing any bulletin board material, not getting too ahead of himself, staying focused on the task at hand but confident in what the Dragons can do.
“We know what we’re capable of,” Moore said. “Going into the tournament, we want to get a win on Saturday and roll into the tournament with momentum. I’m not going to say too much. I know what we can do. We know what we can do in our locker room. I think we can be real successful.”
So do I. It would not surprise me to see Drexel cutting down the nets in D.C., on Tuesday. Nor would it surprise me to see them going home on Sunday night. That’s not a knock on the Dragons, just a recognition of how competitive the CAA is this season.
But any team that knocks off Drexel is going to have to be at its best. Because the Dragons have the talent, depth and balance.
Sometimes it’s Moore. Sometimes it’s Williams. Sometimes it’s House.
Always, though, it’s someone.
Just like the sign says:
Sometimes you, sometimes me, always us
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Aaron Bracy has been covering Philadelphia sports since 1996. His byline regularly appears on Associated Press stories. Big5Hoops.com is his second website dedicated to Philadelphia college basketball. Follow Bracy on X: @Aaron_Bracy and like his Facebook and Instagram pages.
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Big 5 Hoops Rankings
(Through games Feb. 29)
1. Villanova 16-12, 9-8 Big East
2. Drexel 19-11, 12-5 CAA
3. Saint Joseph’s 17-11, 7-8 Atlantic 10
4. La Salle 14-15, 5-11 Atlantic 10
5. Temple 11-17, 4-11 American
6. Penn 10-16, 2-9 Ivy League
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Big Hoops Scoring Leaders
(Through games Feb. 29)
1. Clark Slajchert, Penn, 17.4
2. Erik Reynolds II, Saint Joseph’s, 16.7
3. Eric Dixon, Villanova, 16.3
4. Hysier Miller, Temple, 15.5
5. Khalil Brantley, La Salle, 15.3
6. Tyler Perkins, Penn, 14.0
7. Jhamir Brickus, La Salle, 13.8
8. Xzayvier Brown, Saint Joseph’s, 13.0
9. Justin Moore, Drexel, 12.9
10. Jordan Riley, Temple, 12.4
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Big 5 Hoops Rebound Leaders
(Through games Feb. 29)
1. Amari Williams, Drexel, 7.9
2. Nick Spinoso, Penn, 7.7
3. Rasheer Fleming, Saint Joseph’s, 7.1
4. Tyler Burton, Villanova, 6.5
T5. Eric Dixon, Villanova, 6.3
T5. Christ Essandoko, Saint Joseph’s, 6.3
7. Jahlil White, Temple, 6.1
8. Jordan Riley, Temple, 6.0
9. Sam Hofman, Temple, 5.9
10. Steve Settle III, Temple, 5.7