College of Charleston 55, Wofford 50
Top Performers:
Andrew Lawrence 10 points, 8 rebounds, 7 assists
Karl Cochran 23 points, 2 steals
Senior night could not have gone much better for Bart Benton. The walk-on, who's career high of three points came in his freshman season, got his first career start last night. Minutes into the game he swished a three, the TD Arena crowd erupted and he reveled in the spotlight on the night in which he and teammates Andrew Lawrence and Matt Sundberg were recognized.
Even though Bart's start was honorary, the team needed his bucket. Minutes before the game Anthony Stitt was scratched with a minor knee injury he had suffered against Gardner Webb. Stitt is still listed as day-to-day and despite telling doctors he was good to go he was held out for precautionary purposes. This could have been trouble for two reasons. One, the Cougar offense and outside shooting flows much better with Stitt on the court. Two, Anthony was largely responsible for defending Karl Cochran the last time around. As Cochran goes so do the Terriers and the responsibility would fall to Nori Johnson.
What was disconcerting though was the zero minutes registered by Trevonte Dixon with Stitt out. The sophomore guard hasn't seen much time this season with Lawrence and Stitt being so productive, but just two weeks ago we were talking about his potential role in three-guard lineups. One would think he would be first off the bench with Stitt out but alas Wojcik went with different choices.
For one stretch in the first half Coach went with a no point guard lineup that had Anthony Thomas facilitating the offense. The results were pretty disastrous. The Cougars committed a number of their 16 turnovers in that period (Baru had 7 on the night). Wojcik quickly got Andrew Lawrence back into the game and the team recovered. So really strange scenario that few would expect.
The zone once again gave the Cougars some trouble, but I think we looked better against the 2-3 than we did against Garder Webb. Hall and Lawrence made some buckets from the elbow cavity and Trent was able to neutralize some of the inside pressure by converting on some strong moves to the basket. In the pregame post I mentioned how I wanted the team to get more experience against this defensive set and Mike Young obliged.
Still a lot of positive in this win however. The Cougars absolutely dominated the rebounding margin 44-27. That was a big factor in sticking in the game early despite the missed threes and multiple turnovers. Nori Johnson also stepped up big in limiting Cochran. Nori got caught up in a few two-man screens and Cochran finished with 23 points- but he shot 10 for 27. Attempting nearly half your teams shots and hitting 37%? Johnson, Wojcik and any other team will take that all day.
Three years ago, when these two teams were atop the conference, I would have expected this type of boxscore. But if you told me one team had a shooting guard attempt 27 shots and the other out-rebounded them by 17 I would assume the teams on last nights score sheet were switched.
In the second half things opened up for the Cougs offensively. CofC shot 4-8 from three and 58% from the floor to cruise to one final home victory this season. Only Willis Hall and Andrew Lawrence finished in double figures but the bench contributed 29 points and even Bart Benton got on the score sheet. That should make your day right there.
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