Senior Night Success: Hofstra to Enter CAA Tourney After Rare Win

HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. -- The veteran guidance of graduate transfer students Zeke Upshaw and Dion Nesmith, and senior forward Stephen Nwaukoni have helped freshman forward Jamall Robinson grow into a better player this season.

But when it came time to send Upshaw and Nwaukoni off of the Mack Sports Complex floor for a final time in style, Robinson paid them back.

Scoring 15 of his game-high (and career-best) 22 points in the second half, Robinson steered the Hofstra Pride (9-22, 5-11 CAA) to an 82-71 victory over the James Madison Dukes (11-19, 6-10 CAA) in the Colonial Athletic Association regular season finale for those teams on Saturday night.

Snapping a five-game losing streak, the Pride won for only the second time over a 12-game span since January 22 (when Hofstra earned an impressive 17-point home win over third-place William & Mary).

The Pride’s other win (61-52) in that stretch likewise ended a five-game skid, and was over North-Carolina Wilmington,  which also lost to Hofstra at home, 69-64, on January 15.

Those two teams will meet next on Friday night (with Hofstra as the eight seed and UNCW seeded ninth), in the first round of the CAA tournament in Baltimore (where Robinson will play in his home state of Maryland), with the winner to face top-seeded Delaware at noon the following day.

“We’re really happy to get this win,” said head coach Joe Mihalich, who was brought in after 15 years at Niagara to begin the process of resurrecting a program that had as many player arrests (six) as Division I wins last year.

While all of those players are long gone, Hofstra has continued to struggle record-wise but is once again on the right track. And the focus of Mihalich’s new team was in the correct place on Senior Night.

Mihalich said, “The battle cry was, ‘Let’s finish the season off the right way.’ We have a little mojo going into the tournament in Baltimore.”

With Robinson shining, Upshaw (18 points), Nesmith (12 points, five assists no turnovers) and Nwaukoni (nine points, game-high 13 rebounds) all did their parts, as did junior forward Moussa Kone and sophomore forward Darren Payen, each of whom added eight points on efficient 4-of-6 shooting.

“We got a lot of contributions from a lot of people,” noted Mihalich, who while calling Robinson’s game “terrific,” said, “It was great that our seniors did something so special. Stephen had 13 rebounds and Zeke… I don’t know he does it, he just keeps scoring points.”

Russian graduate forward Andrey Semenov (17 points), sophomore guards Ron Curry and Charles Cooke (15 points each) and freshman guard Jackson Kent (10 points) gave JMU good balance among the Dukes’ starting five, but that quartet combined for all but 14 of its team’s scoring.

For a while, that was working out well for JMU, which after trailing, 9-4, and missing seven of its first nine shots, made its next six field goal attempts (and at one point, scored nine straight points), to lead, 22-17.

That spurt came without Nesmith (who unlike Upshaw, still has one year of eligibility remaining), after the transfer from Northeastern and Monmouth picked up two fouls within 21 seconds and went to the bench for the rest of the half, with Hofstra up, 12-11, and 13:58 left before halftime.

Fortunately for Mihalich, he has versatile 6-foot-6 sophomore Jordan Allen (five points, five rebounds, game-high six assists), who can play small forward as well as run the point when Nesmith is out.

In that role, Mihalich also relied on Robinson, who said of his big game, “It felt great,” while adding, “I just stepped my game up a little bit more. Coach just challenged me to play more of a point guard position, so I took it as a challenge to play the best I could.”

After Robinson tied the game, 26-26, on a jumper, and Payen, the same, at 28-28, the Dukes used a 7-1 run to go ahead, 35-29. But the Pride countered with the next eight points, to lead, 37-35. Half of those points during the run came from Upshaw, who after scoring half of Hofstra’s first 14 points, went 10:35 without scoring.

Cooke, who led all scorers with 12 first-half points, made a 3-pointer with 4.3 seconds left in the half to give the Dukes a 41-39 edge at the break.

JMU was like a different team from the floor after that point, shooting just 24.2 percent (8-for-33), after making 60.9 percent (14-for-23) of its shots in the opening half.

Such a drastic change, Mihalich thought, was a result Pride’s better effort. “More of an intangible than an X’s and O’s thing,” he said. “I felt we had a little more passion, a little more energy. Our transition defense was better as well.”

The teams traded consecutive runs of seven straight points, as the Pride moved ahead, 52-46, only to see the Dukes regain the lead, 53-52.

Another 7-1 spurt put Hofstra up, 69-62, with 5:17 left, before the Pride pulled away late.

Two free throws by Cooke brought JMU to within 70-66, with 3:04 remaining, following a key block by Nwuakoni 52 seconds earlier, but Hofstra scored the next four points, as Robinson sank a pair of free throws to give the Pride a 74-66 advantage, with 1:03 left.

Including those two free throws, Hofstra scored its final 10 points at the foul line. Nesmith and Upshaw each made two foul shots over that period, and Robinson the other six, including two that gave the Pride a comfortable 80-71 edge, with 36.7 seconds to go.

A four-time CAA Rookie of the Week, Robinson especially thanks team leaders like Upshaw and Nwaukoni for his aiding in his early success.

“They helped me a lot,” he said. “They always pulled me aside and say something to me… they always keep me underneath their wing, so that’s a big help.”

Robinson added, “My teammates are always getting on me about being confident when I play. Sometimes, I kind of play tentative because I’m a freshman, but I think as the season started going along, I started getting out of that.”

If he continues to do that, Robinson will have many bright spots before he experiences what Nwaukoni and Upshaw did on Saturday.

“It was a very emotional moment [for] me and Zeke,” Nwaukoni said. “ It was a great experience. It’s my last home game. Why not leave it all out on the court? I just came with the mentality before the game, [to] just go all out as soon as I stepped on the court. That’s exactly what I did.”

For Upshaw, it was even more special because of his road to get there.

Unlike Nwaukoni, who was recruited by Hofstra and spent his whole college career there, Upshaw took advantage of a new NCAA rule to go from Illinois State -- where he scored a total of 100 points while playing sparingly over three years -- to finishing his last regular season as the CAA’s second-leading scorer, with 19.6 points per game.

“At Illinois State, I did my best to just keep my confidence up and this year has definitely helped me do that,” Upshaw said. “[The NCAA rule] means everything because without that rule, I wouldn’t be here. I’m definitely supportive of that rule a hundred percent.”

“I think it’s a great rule,” Mihalich added -- a candid admission that drew much laughter from the press room.

Finally given a real chance to show his abilities, Upshaw greatly appreciated the entire night and the season, even through 22 losses.

“It was amazing,” he said. “The amount of people that came out to show support [tonight], it was great. I can’t even describe how good it’s been, and credit to Coach and my teammates for believing in me. This is the best year of my life… and we’re not done yet.”

Both Mihalich and Nwaukoni share that confidence, with the Pride’s coach pointing to close losses in Hofstra’s three previous games.

“We just played the three best teams in the league,” Mihalich said. “Tie game with a minute to go against Delaware, down five, with the ball, 25 seconds to go against (second-seeded) Towson and then William & Mary, down two, with a minute to go. They’re the three best teams in the league and we were right there with them… we respect the heck out of everybody in this league, but we also know that if we play well, we can beat anybody.”

Still, Mihalich knows that any self-assuredness from a regular season sweep over UNCW needs to be carefully tempered by the difficulty of trying to beat a conference rival for a third time in the same season.

“Not to be hypocritical, but [that’s true] on both ends,” he said. “We’re not thinking about the fact that we beat them twice. We’re just thinking about that one game and play as well as we can… and if you can get one, you keep playing.”

Additionally, Hofstra’s lack of depth will become a major concern if the Pride is fortunate to advance. Yet Mihalich chose to take an optimistic approach with that as well.

“That would be a positive problem, if we have to worry about playing four games in four days,” he said, while also revealing Hofstra’s secret weapon in that regard.

“We have a terrific strength and conditioning coach, Brian Burke,” Mihalich said. “[He] does a fantastic job. These guys are in the best shape of their lives, and if we have to dig down deep a little bit, we will.”

As far as thinking that the Pride can win the CAA tournament and earn an automatic NCAA berth, despite its low seed, Nwaukoni isn’t quite ready to call it a career.

“We’re trying to take it all,” he said. 

“We’re trying to win the championship [and] go as far as we can. That’s the goal.”

CAA Men's Basketball Championship Schedule (at Baltimore Arena, Baltimore, MD):

First Round - Friday, March 7
Game 1:  #8 Hofstra vs. #9 UNCW, 7 p.m.

Quarterfinals - Saturday, March 8
Game 2:  #1 Delaware vs. Game 1 Winner, noon
Game 3:  #4 Drexel vs. #5 Northeastern, 2:30 p.m.
Game 4:  #2 Towson vs. #7  James Madison, 6 p.m.
Game 5:  #3 William & Mary vs. #6 College of Charleston, 8:30 p.m.

Semifinals - Sunday, March 9
Game 6:  Game 2 Winner vs. Game 3 Winner, 2:30 p.m.
Game 7:  Game 4 Winner vs. Game 5 Winner, 5 p.m.

Finals - Monday, March 10
Game 8:  Game 6 Winner vs. Game 7 Winner, 7 p.m.