.png&width=24&type=webp)
Princeton University Athletics
Princeton University
Concordia (N.Y.)
.png&width=84&height=84&quality=100&type=webp)
Players Mentioned
Team Effort Leads Men's Basketball to 64-44 Win over Concordia
January 25, 2009 | Men's Basketball
Box Score
For video highlights, live games, archived video and press conferences, click here to sign up for Tiger Zone
PRINCETON -- The annual game between the end of the finals break and before the start of the Ivy League season is a time for the Princeton men's basketball team to shake off the hoops rust collected while focusing on the books. It's a tune-up every Tiger needs before the rigors of the league schedule.
From the looks of Sunday's 64-44 win over Concordia (N.Y.), every last Tiger took the opportunity. The first 11 players in the game scored and all 13 who were wearing a uniform played as Princeton ran its win streak to three games, its longest in nearly a year.
"I felt early on in the preseason that we're a solid-shooting team," said Sydney Johnson, the Franklin C. Cappon-Edward G. Green '40 head coach of Princeton basketball. "It was nice to have it tonight. I just hope we can be consistent."
Seven Tigers hit three-pointers as the team sank a season-high nine shots from beyond the arc for the second-straight game. Princeton also enjoyed its largest lead of the season -- 22 on a Max Huc bucket inside of two minutes left in the game -- while committing a season-low seven turnovers and getting to the free-throw line more often than its opponent for the first time this season. While the Tigers shot only six free throws, hitting five, Concordia had just three attempts from the line, making two.
Concordia's rhythm gained from playing five times since the Tigers last suited up Jan. 7 at Lehigh showed early. The Clippers scored the game's first five points, but Princeton had the next 10 and never relinquished the lead. By halftime, the lead was 13 points and it mostly inched upward from there, dipping into single-digits only once. Kenny Gaskins, one of two Concordia players in double-figures, hit a basket at the 15:45 mark of the second half to cut the deficit to nine.
The Clippers' Samuel Batista led all scorers with 15 points while Douglas Davis was Princeton's only double-digit scorer with 11.
"It was nice for us to gain momentum going into the league," junior Marcus Schroeder said after coming up just short of a double-double with nine points and eight rebounds. "It's for real now. Every game is important and we've got to continue this."
The win came on the 40th anniversary of the first game at Jadwin Gym, a win over Penn on Jan. 25, 1969. It was an event not lost on Johnson, who contributed to some exciting moments in the building during his playing years in the 1990s.
"All these incredible players and then obviously you've got great coaching, not only from the head coach, but names like Carmody and Thompson and Scott and Hill and Levy and so on," Johnson said. "To be a part of that is pretty neat. We're trying to build our own history, though. Let's celebrate Jadwin and 40 years of Princeton basketball, but let's get some wins now and try to add to arguably one of the best legacies in this part of the country."