the columbia lions mens’ basketball team won its first two games of the season by furiously rallying against the binghamton bearcats and then coasting against div iii mt st vincent’s of the bronx in a glorified scrimmage. having established that they could win, they promptly went on a four game losing streak. they could not overcome lehigh at stabler arena; they battled manfully (especially in the first half) at chestnut hill against the bigger boston college eagles before succumbing; and then played their two worst games of this newly christened season. they lost by 23 at levien to the lafayette leopards before traveling to baltimore to be slaughtered by the talented retrievers of University of Maryland, Baltimore County.
being, at times, slaves to our misery, we will briefly recount those two waterloos. for the first nine minutes of the game against the pennsylvanian patriot leaguers, the lions stayed in the battle. with 10:58 on the first half clock, the light blue was tied with lafayette at 14. the next five minutes and six seconds provided the following entertainment: a missed jump shot by patrick harding followed by a turnover and foul by luke bolster. those follies were the opening acts for a missed lay up by geronimo rubio de la rosa, missed three points attempts by first liam murphy and then xavier mclean, a blown lay up by messr mclean that led to two missed de la rosa treys which sandwiched two botched lay ups by josh odonowu. lafayette, having remembered the object of the game, took the opportunity to open up a 32 – 14. the teams basically traded baskets down the final five minutes of the period which ended with the leopards up 42 – 22 and the game effectively over as the lions finished the night shooting a miserable 4 – 21 from the three point stripe and an only marginally better 13 – 39 from inside that line. these team stats reflected, of course, individual failures. de la rosa went 1 – 6 from the three point arc and 2 – 10 from elsewhere. liam murphy shot 1 – 4 from deep and 0 – 2 inside. xavier mclean was similarly bad going 1 – 7 on the perimeter and missing both his shots down low. the only satisfactory performances came from josh odonowu who went 5 – 10 on his way to 11 points and patrick harding who grabbed 12 rebounds.
the lions’ offense continued to misfire during their brief visit to maryland to take on the umbc retrievers. once again, the light blue chose to chase their opponent. they quickly trailed by ten points and did not stain the score board until the first five minutes of the game had passed. coach engles and his staff subsequently endured two more scoring draughts in excess of two and half minutes and a third of just under two minutes during the balance of first half play. that all adds up to about twelve and half minutes waiting for a stinking basket. geronimo de la rosa, the team’s leading scorer remained in a deep funk, going 0 – 4 from the three point line, 0 – 5 from everywhere else and, not wanting to spoil the perfection of his troubles, 0 – 2 from the foul line. we abuse, unfairly perhaps, the talented first year guard who sparks the lion attack. so thorough was umbc’s dismantlement of columbia, that even had de la rosa contributed his customary 15 ppg, our heroes would have lost by 25. which mathematical exercise allows us to remind readers that columbia fell 98 – 60.
the america east squad that slaughtered columbia on december’s first day is the descendant of the feisty crew that shocked the hoops universe four marches ago when they dropped the number one ranked virginia squad in the first round of the ncaa tourney – the first 16 seed to ever pull off that trick. under first year coach bob ferry, who has previously helmed the programs at liu, duquesne and penn state, the retrievers are tough, quick and deep. most entertainingly, they are led at the point by messr darnell rogers – all 5′ 2″ and 150 pounds of him. hoops fanatics will be forgiven grumbling recollections of all time little guys calvin murphy and nate archibald. rogers does not give an inch to any competitor on the hardwood and fearlessly matched up with the 19 inches taller pat harding on a couple of defensive switches. with an unobstructed view of harding’s nipples, rogers gamely battled for position until he could safely hand off his responsibility to a more appropriately sized teammate. when not required to play defense, rogers did his job on the other end of the floor, shooting 3 – 6 from three point range and 3 – 4 from the inside. his 17 points led his fellow retrievers en route to their rout.
having played as poorly as they have so far this campaign, both individually and ensemble, the lions limped home to face a similarly staggering team, the maine black bears who came into levien off a 32 point loss to bradley. columbia led from the opening tap – an approach to the game they had hitherto eschewed. by half time they led 39 – 25, thanks first to patrick harding’s stalwart play in the post where he scored eleven points and grabbed nine rebounds. harding’s yeomanry continued in the second half and he finished the game with fifteen points and seventeen rebounds – the transfer’s first double double as a lion and his best haul of boards this season. his game long labors were necessary, for though the light blue stretched their lead to 47 – 27 less than two minutes into the final period, they would suffer through another stretch of the ice colds to which they recently subjected their rooters. with 13:33 on the clock, maine had cut the lead to ten and three minutes later pulled within three at 49 – 46 on the second of consecutive back door cuts for lay ins. at the 9:20 mark, coach engles threw a wrinkle at bears’ coach, rich barron, by having the lions abandon their switching man to man for a two – three zone. the change upset the mainers’ comeback rhythm and though the lions only stayed in the zone for one possession, it cost the visitors two time outs and a wasted trip running a couple of plays better suited to attacking the quickly abandoned zone than the man to man to which the lions had already returned. that defensive stutter step by coach engles was enough to derail the charge by the boys from orono and though the game wasn’t locked up until the clock showed exactly two minutes remaining when eddie turner iii went the length of the court and finished with a pretty handoff to josh odonowu for a lay up that stretched the lion lead to nine, the spectators’ anxieties had been soothed.
we apologize for this perhaps overly lugubrious description of columbia’s second win this season against a div i opponent, especially as it is merely prologue to the following points: the young, still under experienced hoopsters like to play at an upbeat tempo and that has been both the most enjoyable aspect of their team character and a decided liability when they have suddenly become incapable of scoring. they have a habit of rushing from one poor shot after another rather than running their offense to find a better opportunity. the mad dash upcourt, when it does not yield a dazzling jump hook from messr turner or crazy good eurostep finish from young de la rosa or pull up j from the improving shockley-okeke, too often ignores the chance for harding to catch up and set up down low when he can operate efficiently or results in chaotic spacing and inefficient passing. festina lente, we urge our youthful heroes. they will need to avoid scoring droughts over their next two contests against a colgate team that is better than it has played so far and the great danes of suny albany who are off to an uncharacteristic 1 – 6 start. a couple of wins would be great for the lions, a couple of tough losses would be acceptable, if they play up to their talent.
peace out and d up,
paulie b