on the last dreary saturday of december, the columbia lions men’s basketball team hosted some 1,200 fans for their battle with the fairfield stags. the game promised little, appeared a mismatch almost. the 10 -1 lions seemed likely to run the 5 – 7 stags off the court. a 10 1/2 point betting line was the harshest endorsement of that opinion. and yet, sports fans, they still play the games.
the light blue was missing their leading rebounder and third leading scorer, 6′ 8″ forward blair thompson, due to “personal reasons.” coach engles filled his slot with first year mason ritter who made his debut as a starter. nigel clarkson, another first year, would see early minutes also as engles tested the effectiveness of unusual front court combinations. other personnel adjustments were soon made as well. nico romanelli, the seldom used sophomore from australia was off the bench early spelling point guard avery brown. romanelli shared significant minutes with first year back courter gerard okeefe. gianni cobb, the freshman from chicago who has logged most of the minutes backing brown up to date did not play. robbie stankard, a 6′ 9″ senior, hit the hardwood before his classmate jake tavroff – another unusual decision by engles. as it had been 24 days since the crew’s last clash with a div i team (and their only loss to date), an 88 – 73 humbling at suny-albany, allgame lacks rationales for the changes. one thing was certain, the light blue was not crisp at the outset. as the new columbia rotations got to know one another, fairfield went to work, shooting fifty percent from the field and and 6 – 11 or 55% from three point range. that exuberant sharpshooting, combined with the lions’ 8 turnovers and, shockingly, zero points from scoring leader geronimo rubio de la rosa, led to the stags 41 – 32 halftime advantage. perhaps the brightest spot for the home team was the play of center zine beddri who tallied eight points while grabbing seven boards. kenny noland also shone tallying 11 points in the opening stanza.
fortunately, the second half provided the regression to statistical means that allows amateur gamblers to wager with confidence on apparent mismatches. de la rosa erupted for 27 second half points, shooting 5 – 6 from beyond the three point arc, while fairfield’s sharpshooters cooled off to a more normal 38% accuracy from deep. that coincidence and the continued yeoman’s work by beddri (who finished with 17 rebounds) on the boards allowed the lions to steadily come back, finally snatching 54 -53 lead off a kenny noland drive with just under ten minutes to play. down the stretch fairfield did not quit, but columbia’s care taking of the ball and steadiness at the charity stripe (13 – 13 in the period) resulted in the complete reversal of the first half script as the lions walked out of levien with an 85 – 72 victory.
that brings us to today, readers. the lions travel to piscataway, new jersey where they will battle rutgers’ scarlet knights, one of the two toughest squads on our heroes’ non-conference schedule. steve pikiell’s team features a couple of likely nba ballers and two of the most highly touted first years in the nation, dylan harper and ace bailey. that pair of young stars will be trying to re-float the new jerseyans boat after their last second fail against princeton back on december 21. the tigers were 6.5 point dogs in that battle but handled their business under the backboards and escaped with an 82 – 81 win. the lions are being given 11.5 points in this afternoon’s clash. i would take the points as the lions are quick enough to hang with their hosts if the lions do not turn the ball over, hit the boards, and defend the bejesus out of rutgers’ supporting players, they could very well drop the knights, even if harper or bailey outperforms their usual combined 41 points per game.
a 12 – 1 finish to the first half of the season would be very encouraging and have allgame and the rest of columbia’s fan base straining at the leash for the arrival of cornell’s five on saturday january 11. the fight for an ivy title begins soon and this is the best chance the light blue has had in year’s to contend.
peace out and d up,
paulie b