By Paul Gotham
BETHLEHEM, PA. — You’ll have to forgive Colgate Raiders head coach Matt Langel if he accentuates the precious nature of a basketball game. After all 2013-14 is fresh on the mind of the fourth-year coach – a season when his Raiders dropped 11 of 12 Patriot League games by single digits. Three of those setbacks were of single-possession nature and another came in double overtime to Lehigh to open PL play.
“We talk about the fragility of college basketball all the time,” Langel said during the recent Patriot League Media Day as he referenced his mentor and former coach Fran Dunphy. “The game is fragile. You got to take every single second so seriously.”
“There are going to be games where it’s a two-point game [and what you do on one play] is potentially going to be a difference maker in the game,” Langel continued. “In practice every single day paying attention to all those details can really make a difference in the course of your entire season.”
Colgate won four of six to start last season. Their two losses came on the road at Atlantic Coast Conference foes Syracuse and Wake Forest. Against the Demon Deacons, the Raiders led by as many as eight early in the second half before falling by 11, 89-78.
The Raiders then rattled off four straight beating Cornell, St. Francis (Pa.), Tulane and Binghamton all by double digits.
“In some of our early season successes a lot of the games weren’t even close,” Langel added. “We won convincingly. All of sudden, as young people you maybe take for granted that your shots are all going to go in, or that calls are going to go your way.”
Six games into the campaign, Colgate led the nation hitting 51 percent behind the arc (finished 13th in the country at 39 percent).
The Raiders then missed their first eight from long range in a 61-55 loss to Big East for Georgetown – a game in which the Raiders cut the deficit to four with less than one minute remaining.
Colgate won two more non-conference games before dropping the first five in league play including an eight-point loss on the road to pre-season PL favorite Boston University.
“We had a lot of early year, non-league success, and maybe they didn’t realize how fragile league games can be,” Langel noted. “We’re hopeful that we learned through that process. I think that our guys have learned that lesson, and they’re doing a much better job of paying attention to all the small things.”
Four starters return from that squad, and fifth-year player Pat Moore will get back in the lineup after missing most of last season recovering from an injury. Ethan Jacobs (11.5 ppg, 4.3 rpg) and Austin Tillotson (13.3 ppg, 4.4 apg, 48 percent 3-pt.) start their second seasons in Hamilton, N.Y. after transferring from Ohio U and Monmouth respectively.
Colgate graduated leading scorer Murphy Burnatowski (14.2 ppg), but as Langel notes the Raiders will put more experience on the floor than any time during his tenure.
“In a way, we’re very old, but for the first time we’re experienced. We were somewhat old last year. Ethan being a fourth-year college guy, and Austin being in his third year. But now they both have a whole year under their belt.”
Damon Sherman-Newsome (11.3 ppg) and Luke Roh (6.2 ppg, 5.5 rpg) round out the top returners.
If Colgate is to challenge for the Patriot League title, Langel knows his squad will need to improve on the defense.
“Those guys returning have a chip on their shoulder certainly on the defensive end of the floor where we weren’t nearly as efficient as we were on the offensive end,” Langel explained. “[We have] to make a statement that we can be a little bit more competitive there this year.”
Colgate ranked ninth in the PL in field goal percentage defense (46.9) and fifth in rebound margin (-0.4).
“We have to be willing to sacrifice some of our offensive energy to use it on the defensive end,” Langel noted. “Defense is one of those things where you have your X’s and O’s in place on how you’re going to guard ball screens and what your schemes are going to be, but it’s really about using the players being committed to doing it.”
“I don’t know if we’re going to be a Duke kind of defensive team that’s going to get out and deny people far away from the basket and force a lot turnovers. You look at the San Antonio Spurs. Conceptually, they talk about sharing the ball and playing the right way on offense. We’ve done a very good job of developing that, but they also make plays on defense…They make timely plays. They get loose balls. They come up with critical rebounds. It’s a conceptual kind of thing. Your players ultimately have to take ownership in.”
Colgate went 6-3 with Moore in the lineup last year. The 6-5 guard netted a season-high of 17 against Wake Forest and Tulane, but did not play a second in conference games.
“We were doing pretty well when we lost him,” Langel commented. “As the season loomed on, the guys started to realize that they missed the guy who would bail them out late in the shot clock by burying the deep three or putting it on the floor and getting it in the paint and making a floater or whatever it might be.”
“You realize how lucky we are to be able to play,” Moore said of the experience of taking in a season from the sidelines. “Every day matters. You notice individual things. How hard people are working at practice. When you’re playing sometimes it’s hard to realize. When you’re sitting back and watching, you’re getting a different view – a whole new perspective.”
“I’ve been really impressed with his mental approach,” Langel said of Moore. “Having to sit out and see the game from the sideline only heightened his passion for the game and his wanting to be part of a successful team. He’s very comfortable with his teammates. If on a given night he’s feeling it where he is on one of those runs where he’s makes four or five 3s then all of sudden he might not have a big night. He just as happy to make the extra pass.”
Transfers Tom Rivard (James Madison) and Jordan Swopshire (Bradley) join the lineup this year along with freshmen Sean O’Brien and Jordan Robertson.
Colgate opens its 115th season with four games on the road before returning to the friendly confines of Cotterell Court on November 26th to play Albany.
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