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Princeton University Athletics
Princeton University
Lafayette
Players Mentioned
Huge Second Half Lifts Men's Hoops Over Lafayette
December 01, 2011 | Men's Basketball
Throwing down four dunks in the final nine minutes, the Tigers made better than two-thirds of their attempts after the break to race past Lafayette 69-54 on Carril Court in Jadwin Gym.
The fireworks brought cheers from the 1,500-plus in attendance in what was these fans' last chance to see Princeton on campus against a Division I opponent until February 10. As scheduling quirks would have it, the Tigers play 12 of their next 13 games on the road, with the lone exception against The College of New Jersey on Jan. 8.
"I think we've looked like a team in stretches (this season), but tonight I thought it was, for the most part, it was a group of guys that were playing for each other," Henderson, the Franklin C. Cappon-Edward G. Green '40 head coach of men's basketball, said. "It's a passionate game and we had some life and energy. That's what makes us good. Now if we can just do that and still play smart, I think we could be pretty good."
"I think it really shows the way we can truly play," Ian Hummer added. "I think the second half really showed what we are capable of."
It was a victory Princeton (3-5) needed after a suboptimal weekend in Lewisburg, Pa., where the Tigers went 1-2 with the only victory coming against Division II West Alabama Sunday afternoon. During the weekend, Henderson said changes in playing time would come and called for more emotion out of his team.
Henderson is now 2-0 with the starting lineup of seniors Douglas Davis and Patrick Saunders, juniors Mack Darrow and Hummer and sophomore T.J. Bray. Darrow is the latest addition to the order, getting his first career start Sunday after a year of playing as a reliable producer off the bench.
Darrow continued making passes that produced baskets with hardly a miscue. After four assists and one turnover tonight, Darrow has 21 assists and nine turnovers on the season including 13 helpers and one giveaway over the last four games.
Bray kept his improvement going as well, having a positive assist-to-turnover ratio for the third straight game while not making a turnover for the first time in eight games this season. That good-looking zero in the turnover column was alongside six assists against the Leopards (3-4).
Meanwhile, Princeton got production on offense out of its two most reliable sources, Hummer and Davis. Both had historical accomplishments in the game, as Hummer reached 791 career points, passing his father, Ed Hummer '67, who was a sophomore on Princeton's Final Four team in 1965 and finished his three varsity seasons with 786 points.
"Being in the same household as a guy who did very well at Princeton, just to pass him is pretty special for me, especially doing it at Jadwin," Ian Hummer said. "That's where I wanted to do it. I'm glad I did it before we got on a long road trip."
Along with the 23 points, which were just two off his career high, Hummer was close to a double-double again, finishing with nine rebounds to mark the third time this season he has been one board away from a double-double. He already has two of them this season.
Davis finished with 15 points, his highest since scoring 16 against Buffalo on Nov. 19. For his career, Davis moved into an 11th-place tie on the Princeton scoring list with 1,207 points alongside his coach's classmate, Steve Goodrich '98. Davis can move into 10th place when he passes Brian Taylor '84 (entered with the Class of 1973) at 1,239 points.
But the most important tangible developments may have come from outside the starting five. Freshman Denton Koon added a career-high 13 points and seven rebounds during his 22 minutes, while junior Will Barrett tied a career high with eight rebounds and added four assists, three blocks and three steals in his 28 minutes on the court.
"Any time you can get a guy coming off the bench with 13 and 7, four offensive rebounds, that's good," Henderson said of Koon. "Very good."
For the game's first 27 minutes, however, a victory for the Tigers was anything but assured. After eight ties and five lead changes, Princeton went on a 12-2 run to break open a 40-39 lead and push the advantage into double digits.
Only once, and just briefly, did the lead dip back to nine. Princeton led by as much as 18 points at 69-51 before Rob Delaney, an alumnus of the nearby Lawrenceville School, canned a 3-pointer with just less than a minute to go to make the final 15-point margin.
Ryan Willen led Lafayette with 16 points while four other players were a bucket away from reaching double figures. That list included Lafayette's leading scorer on the season, Jim Mower, who entered the night averaging 20 points per game but scored just nine on 2-of-6 shooting against Princeton.
With the win, Princeton has taken three straight against Lafayette for the first time since Henderson was in uniform. The teams have played annually since the 1990-91 season, and Lafayette is Princeton's second-most common non-Ivy League opponent after Rutgers.
The team's first back-to-back wins of the season now in place, Princeton will face those same Scarlet Knights (4-3, vs. LSU Saturday) next Wednesday looking to end a five-game losing streak at the RAC as the Tigers' last win in Piscataway came in 1999.
The game against Rutgers will be the first of three straight in December that are within an hour's drive of Princeton, with games at Drexel (Dec. 10) and Rider (Dec. 14) to follow.
"I like the makeup of this team to win games on the road," Henderson said. "We've got some veteran guys like Ian, like Doug that have won tough games on the road. We need to learn how to do that."