The weekend could not have gone any better for Rensselaer men’s basketball Head Coach Mike Griffin. Both of his teams won.
RPI swept its last conference road trip with a pair of come-from-behind victories over St. Lawrence 63-59 and Clarkson 69-63. And to top it off, the Pittsburgh Steelers won the Super Bowl.
“It was a pretty good weekend,” Griffin, a lifelong Steelers fan, said Monday. “We played very well.”
And by “we” he means the Red Hawks, who erased a five-point second-half deficit against Liberty League front runner St. Lawrence Friday night before digging themselves out of a 19-point hole against Clarkson Saturday afternoon.
Against the Saints, Rensselaer trailed 44-39 with 14:23 remaining in the game, but managed to hold the high-powered St. Lawrence attack to just two baskets in the next nine minutes. The Saints would shoot just over 25 percent in the second half.
While St. Lawrence struggled against the stringent RPI man-to-man defense, RPI chopped away at the lead. The Red Hawks found themselves on top at the 8:42 mark after a Matt Zepernick jumper, and with just under three minutes left in the game, Rensselaer concluded a 19-5 run and held a commanding nine-point lead.
Rensselaer would hit its free throws down the stretch to hold off the desperate Saints. The win would also help alleviate some of the pain left from the colossal collapse RPI suffered when the Saints rallied from 16 points down to defeat the Red Hawks in Troy on January 21.
“It was the best 40 minutes of basketball we played this year,” Griffin said of the St. Lawrence game. “It was very rewarding because we felt we should have beaten them here.”
Senior forward Tom Schneider posted another double-double against the Saints, scoring 18 points and hauling in 10 rebounds. Zepernick, a senior, would also hit double digits in points with 12, while senior Joe Johnson and junior Clay Hadley added nine and eight points, respectively.
Hadley’s performance was particularly huge for the Red Hawks, who were playing without sophomore forward Sam Simmons. The RPI big man was serving a one-game suspension after being ejected for throwing a punch in the Skidmore game on January 28.
While Schneider’s Friday numbers were impressive, they paled in comparison to the 30-point, eight-rebound clinic he put on Saturday against the Golden Knights, most of which came in the Red Hawks’ second half comeback effort.
“He dominated the game,” Griffin saidm “just like the best player in the league should.”
RPI, who trailed by 19 with 17:41 remaining in the second half, was fortunate not to be down 25. Clarkson was burning the nets in the first half, shooting just over 50 percent, compared to RPI’s 29 percent.
“[Clarkson] came out and made everything,” Griffin said. “They had so much energy. They were slashing and diving to the basket from everywhere.”
The second half, however, belonged to Schneider and the Red Hawks.
RPI would shoot 63 percent from the field in the second half and get 19 points from their star down the stretch. Senior guard Paul Halas also hit two huge threes, his only baskets of the game, to propel Rensselaer to victory.
Griffin broke basketball tradition by switching to a 3-2 zone in the second half, despite being way behind. The move worked. The Rensselaer defense successfully clogged the inside, forcing Clarkson into poor shooting situations. The Golden Knights shot just 33 percent in the second frame.
Schneider, who was named Liberty League Forward of the Week for the fourth consecutive week and the sixth time this season, is now just eight points shy of reaching 1000 for his career. He is also poised to move into third on Rensselaer’s all-time rebounding list.
Ironically, the road trip that inevitably destroyed the Red Hawks’ season last year may have saved it this year. RPI was swept by then cellar dwellers Clarkson and St. Lawrence in 2004-2005, and would never be able to recover. This year, however, the trip to the North Country is leaving the Red Hawks firmly perched in the league’s top four.
“It’s been a long time since we’ve been in this situation,” Griffin said. “We know we can compete for the first spots, but we don’t want to be satisfied with that.”
Griffin has his team’s eyes set on a new goal: winning the conference.
Rensselaer has the opportunity to do so with home games against the league’s fourth-place team, Hobart, Friday at 8 pm and conference goliath Hamilton on Saturday at 4 pm. RPI swept Hobart and Hamilton in Robison Gym last year. A repeat of that performance would virtually guarantee the Red Hawks a playoff spot, and put them in the running for the Liberty League crown.
