Atlantic 10 Tournament: Xavier Tops Rival Dayton
Jordan Crawford helped Xavier get past Dayton in the A-10 quarterfinals. (cnati.com)
By Ronak Patel
ronakspatel@hotmail.com
Saturday, March 13, 2010
ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. – What will be talked about in Xavier's Atlantic 10 tournament quarterfinal 78-73 victory over rival Dayton will be a technical foul that took the air out of the crowd at Boardwalk Hall. Xavier now takes on Richmond, who defeated UMass 77-72 late Friday night.
But it wasn't why Dayton lost the game.
With 33 seconds left and Dayton trailing by two, 70-68, guard Rob Lowery called timeout and Xavier's Terrell Holloway swiped at the ball. An agitated Lowery threw a punch in the vicinity of Holloway, but it didn't land. However, the referees assessed a technical foul and reassured it after checking the replay. Holloway nailed two technical free throws and the Musketeers held on for the victory (more on this later).
But what got the Flyers to that point were the same inconsistencies that plagued the team throughout the season: an inability to hit big shots, not being able to get stops, turnovers and rebounds.
"I thought we played pretty darn good, but unfortunately some of things that have harmed us the whole year came back," said Flyers coach Brian Gregory. "We were loose with the ball, made bad decisions at crucial times; couldn't make crucial stops, get crucial rebounds and that was tough.
"When you play a quality team, you can't have those mistakes."
Dayton blew a 15-point lead, and after Marcus Johnson's corner 3-pointer with 11:16 left in the second half the Musketeers clamped down. Dayton's next field goal didn't come until Johnson scored a lay-in with 13 seconds remaining in the game, which wasn't contested by Xavier all that hard because it was preventing a potential foul call. During that long period of ineptitude, Dayton committed six turnovers, missed several point-blank lay-ups, and was hammered on the boards. The Flyers were outrebounded 39-28 in the game. In the two regular season matchups, in which the teams split, Dayton controlled the boards by the whopping total of 93-58.
"We knew it was going to be a physical game," said Xavier head coach Chris Mack. "We tried to pound the message home into our players when we came here that we've been outrebounded by 35 rebounds. While we weren't perfect; I knew win or lose, especially the way we closed the game is we weren't going to be questioned by our toughness."
That mettle was personified by the Musketeers sophomore backcourt battery of Holloway and shooting guard Jordan Crawford, who combined for 42 points (Crawford with 20 and Holloway with 22), 27 of them coming in the second half. Holloway got Xavier's run jump-started when he drained a 3-pointer with 10:15 left on a play that Lowery tripped and provided the opening for the point guard to begin Dayton's descent.
Crawford, who gained acclaim for dunking over LeBron James last summer, tied the game with a step-through lay-in and then Holloway gave Xavier the lead for good on a tough-as-nails drive and lay-in with 1:22 left.
"We just take it as another game," said Crawford. "A couple of people ask me ‘how am I going to take up this A-10 tournament' because it's kind of like my first March Madness. Coach actually said it's my first one in March since I've been in college.
"So I just try to take it as another game and it was time to step up. We were down 15 and there was nothing else I could do but step up."
Mack, who's attempting to be the fourth different Xavier coach to win the A-10 tournament this century (Skip Prosser won it in '02, Thad Matta in '04, and Sean Miller in '06), knows he has something special with Holloway and Crawford.
"Those two guys have really big hearts," said Mack. "They have the guts to make plays down the stretch and they've done it all year. Tonight was no different and I thought those guys being able to get to the rim and really take over the game, you saw the confidence growing in them as the seconds were winding down.
"They are big-time players. That's why our record is what it is and that's why we're here in the winners circle."
TECHNICAL FOUL THOUGHTS
Lowery's technical negated Dayton's attempt to tie the game. Afterwards, both coaches and Holloway weighed in on the technical:
Xavier coach Chris Mack: "I think they were trying to determine if the technical happened whether if it was a punch and assessed a technical before or after the timeout and it was explained to me in the beginning it was a dead ball technical and there would be two free throws and our ball on the side out. Beyond that, I would be lying if I said if I listened to the explanation."
Terrell Holloway: "Lowery was running up the sidelines and tried to call the timeout and I remember since I was a kid one of my old coaches always telling me to swipe at the ball; I actually swiped the ball and (Lowery) probably felt I was trying to foul him and then he tried to throw a punch at me or whatever."
Dayton coach Brian Gregory: "I didn't see it either. I just hope (referees) are right because that was a crucial call. If anything happened after the timeout was called, it was a reaction to it; I told the refs I have no problem with the call being made on Rob if his action was inappropriate, that's a correct call. But if it's a response to something that occurred after the whistle, then something has to be called on that as well. I'm going to be honest with you, if they are right, then they are right. I didn't see it. I haven't seen the clip of it and I just hope they are right. If the timeout was called, a play was ruled dead, then something happened, and then Rob retaliated to that, then you can't just call it on one guy. That's all I'm going to say."
RICHMOND'S GONZALVEZ THANKFUL HE DIDN'T TRANSFER AFTER HIS FRESHMAN YEAR
The easy thing for Richmond's senior shooting guard David Gonzalvez would've been to take the typical road after his freshman season in 2006-07 and transfer. After all, Richmond won just eight games. Gonzalvez, who averaged 9.6 points that season, wasn't happy.
He nearly did transfer but chose to stick it out.
Fast forward to this season and along with fellow seniors Ryan Butler and Kevin Horvde, who's sitting out the season due to a broken ankle he sustained in preseason, the elder statesmen on the team are reaping the benefits of the team's success, a 25-7 record and guaranteed NCAA tournament berth and a semifinal matchup with Xavier. Gonzalvez is second on the team in scoring at 14.3 per game, which is behind A-10 Player of the Year Kevin Anderson's 17.8 points a game. Gonzalvez led the way Friday night with 15 points.
"It's really rewarding because we had seven freshmen my first year and one senior captain who was starting," said Gonzalvez. "It was rough, we had a few guys leave; one guy just quit and played tennis the next year. You know, it was tough.
"I definitely had a change of heart and I'm really glad I stayed."
Richmond coach Chris Mooney has been thankful for the seniors' growth from their freshman seasons.
"I feel great for them," said Mooney. "Ryan and David are the main two reasons we are where we are. Those guys have been tremendous; it was kind of a challenging situation we inherited.
"Therefore our second year, we had a lot of young players who didn't have a lot of experience with failure, didn't have a lot of experience with adversity and they were able to become strong and mature enough to lead us to where we are today."
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