By Pat Mariboe
Senior Sports Writer
The Goose Nation faithful were out in full force during the shoremen’s two-game homestand this past week, but their continued support wasn’t enough to rally their team against Centennial Conference powerhouses Swarthmore and Muhlenberg.
Five minutes into the first half of the game against Swarthmore, a basket from sophomore Brandon Berry propelled the Shoremen to an early 6-4 lead. That was the only lead they’d see all night, as the Garnet went on to win the game 84-61, thanks to a dominant 31 point performance by guard Cam Wiley. In comparison, senior James Drury led the Shoremen with a team high 11 points, while freshman Josh Porteous led the team in assists with three. Coming into the game, the Garnet lead the entire NCAA in rebounding margin per game with +14.6 rebounds and it showed as the Garnet out rebounded the Shoremen 45-25.
In the second game of the week, Muhlenberg got off to a flying start, as they took an 18-5 lead with 13 minutes to go in the first half. The Mules kept the momentum of their hot start and never trailed at any point in the game on their way to a 79-51 victory. Freshman Jack Greer got the fans fired up in the second half, as the sharpshooter went 4-8 from the three point line and finished with a team high and career high of 16 points.
The Shoremen have most certainly been relying on some of their young guns this season and look to get the most out of their dynamic group of freshmen for many more years to come. For freshman standout Alec Lewis, his experience with the Shoremen and transition to college basketball has been a positive one.
“It makes me feel really good,” said Lewis. “Coming into college, I wasn’t expecting to play a whole lot, let alone start my freshman year. It definitely took some time for me to adjust to playing at the collegiate level, but then once I realized that I had the skills to compete with these other players, that’s when I really started to play better and raised my confidence. I’m glad I was able to contribute as much as I have my first year. College is a lot different from high school because every team is good. Almost every player is good and so much bigger. That’s one thing I regret about high school, not lifting enough to get stronger because some of the guys at this level are a lot bigger than me so I tend to get pushed around a lot.”
The Shoremen will be on the road for their next two games as they faceoff against Haverford and Ursinus, two teams they narrowly lost to earlier on in the season.
“They’re two tough teams,” said Lewis. “Winning against both teams won’t be easy at all. What we really need to work on is boxing out and not allowing the other team to get second chance points. We’re a lot smaller compared to Ursinus. They have a very large lineup and that’s why we need to do better rebounding wise. Haverford is quite as big as Ursinus, but they still have some very good players and we need to be aware of their strength and weaknesses so we can figure out how to stop them and hopefully get the win.”