After losing back-to-back games for the first time all season, the Elon University men’s basketball team got back on track, beating Northeastern University 71-60.
Defense took hold of the opening minutes with Elon forcing a shot clock violation on Northeastern’s first offense possession. It started a pattern over the next few minutes as tough defense on both sides forced each possession to take very long. Most possessions would wind down to the end of the shot clock, most often not resulting in points.
Graduate student Matthew Van Komen, who towers at 7-foot-4 and is the third tallest player in the National Collegiate Athletic Association, was the one that created a spark for Elon’s offense. He opened the game with a ferocious dunk to get the Schar Center crowd going. He followed it up with a few other dunks in the first half and nearly accomplished a double-double in the first half alone, scoring 10 points and securing 9 rebounds by halftime. Van Komen said he doesn’t even have to think when it comes to dunking.
“I'm kind of out of body,” Van Komen said in the postgame press conference. “It just kind of happens, like, I'm close to the rim, so I might as well dunk it.”
He also added on two first rejections, adding onto his block total that was ranked 11th in the country going into the game.
Van Komen was a force in the paint as Northeastern had no answer for him. He especially dominated in the offensive rebounding category, getting six of them in the first half and helped Elon extend possessions. His efforts made way for an impressive effort on the glass by the Phoenix, as the team racked up 2 more rebounds than the Huskies. Elon entered the game sixth in the nation in rebounds per game. Head coach Billy Taylor said he believes rebounds are the key to the team’s success and after some recent lackluster rebounding performances, Taylor said the team watched film and approached the game with a different style of aggressiveness.
“We just wanted to play with more physicality, more physicality on defense, more physicality in the paint and more physicality in rebounding, and our guys did that,” Taylor said in the postgame press conference. “We still had our fair share of mistakes, but we were very aggressive, and if we're making mistakes, but we're making aggressive mistakes, we can live with that.”
Midway through the first half, Elon underwent a mistaken-ridden stretch with three turnovers in two minutes that allowed Northeastern to capture a 5-point lead. Aside from the dominance inside the paint, Elon shot poorly from the field. They had a meager 33% field goal percentage and 1-10 from the 3-point line. Sophomore Nick Dorn, who co-leads the team in points per game, was a significant contributor to these percentages, going 0-5 in the first half. But, for the most part it was a tightly contested first half where neither team was able to acquire a healthy lead. Going into halftime, it was tied 28-28.
The Phoenix began the second half on unsteady feet as they turned the ball over three times in the first 2-and-half minutes. But the team got it together soon after with a pair of denials at the rim by Van Komen and junior TK Simpkins. The blocks elicited noises of shock and awe from the crowd and Simpkins followed it up with a 3-pointer, capping off a quick 7-0 run that happened over the course of a minute. Dorn said those turnovers made them focus on ball security.
Simpkins continued to take over with a steal and then an expertly navigated pass to Dorn in the corner for a 3-pointer to give Dorn his first field goal of the day. The 3-pointer extended the Phoenix lead to eight, the largest of the day so far.
Dorn started to get going as he finally began to make shots from the field and utilized fouls to get points off free throws. Elon as a team saw the fouls as an opportunity for points, drawing five more fouls than the first half. Dorn said in the postgame press conference that his increased physicality was a result of the motivation to get a bounce back win.
“We're not just gonna lay down,” Dorn said. “We just want to bring that aspect of physicality and get back to what we do well.”
As Dorn started to shoot better, the team did too as they pushed the lead to double-digits. Elon shot far more efficiently in the second half, shooting 54.5% from the field in the second half. While Elon began to extend their league, Northeastern struggled to shoot. They had a 26% field goal percentage midway through the second half, a lackluster number when compared to their 44% in the first half.
In the final minutes, the Phoenix pulled away thanks to some finishing touches by Dorn and Van Komen. Van Komen finished with a double-double of 14 points and 14 rebounds, and added on 4 blocks. Dorn was the team’s leading scorer with 19.
It was a much needed bounce back win for an Elon team looking to right the ship after two consecutive losses. Taylor said he was proud of how the team responded.
“I thought our guys showed a lot of resolve in terms of how they approached tonight's game,” Taylor said. “We were physical. We were really aggressive on the glass. You could tell that early with our first half rebounding numbers and just carried over for the rest of the game.”
Van Komen said it was a season-defining game that was “do or die.”
“We're two in the hole, so we come out strong or it’s going to be a long rest of the season,” Van Komen said. “So we had to put our foot on the gas and just grind through it.”
The win also marked the 15th win of the season for the Phoenix, the first 15-win season since the 2014-15 season. It was also a significant win for Taylor, personally, as it was his 250th win in his career. Taylor said the accomplishment is a big step for the program but is something that can be reflected upon after the season.
“We're halfway through conference play, so we got a lot more that we can accomplish, still chasing some of those teams at the top of the standings,” Taylor said. “So we're happy about it, but certainly not satisfied.”