William & Mary came out of a timeout with 10 seconds left on the shot clock and 2:04 left in the game, up 64-59 with a chance to seal its 13th-straight home win. With the shot clock running down, Caleb Dorsey put up a desperation three, which glanced off the rim.
Out of nowhere came Chase Lowe, who pulled down the offensive board and finished through contact, getting the hoop and the harm and putting away Drexel for good.
While ugly at times, the Tribe (16-11, 10-4 CAA) put together a gritty second-half defensive performance Saturday to beat Drexel (13-14, 5-9 CAA) 72-59 and keep its spot tied for third in the CAA.
“I thought our guys really paid attention to some of the ways we could guard them, and did a really good job, especially in the second half,” said head coach Brian Earl. “Drexel keeps testing you and testing you, and our guys held up today, which we were really happy with.”
The offensive issues the Tribe had faced since the season-ending injury to Noah Collier seemed to be solved in the first half. The Tribe shot 14-of-28 from the field, including 7-of-15 from behind the arc. Gabe Dorsey did get W&M out of some jams, hitting one from all the way out in Toano to beat the shot clock buzzer on one possession, and shooting 4-of-5 from three in the half. He finished with 17 points on the afternoon.
“It feels pretty good when the shots are falling, teammates are finding each other,” said Gabe Dorsey. “But in the second half, it kind of went the other way, where it was a bunch of guys knocking down big shots and making big plays on offense.”
It was a different story defensively, as Drexel attacked the Tribe in the post and was subsequently able to kick the ball out to open three-point shooters. W&M gave up 1.378 points per possession in the half, much higher than its average in conference play of 1.060.
The game script flipped in the second half. W&M forced tougher shots from the Dragons throughout the period. But W&M struggled to turn that into a discernable run in the first 10 minutes of the half. The Tribe started 4-of-12 from the field in the period, but still slowly gained ground on Drexel.
“They test you a lot individually, and I thought our guys did a good job of keeping the guy in front, but then realizing they’re going to keep coming, which is hard,” Earl said. “It’s like playing at the park — I don’t know if anybody plays at the park anymore, but it’s an old man game, just keep banging and banging and banging. We did a good job helping each other and showing help.”
A Matteus Case layup and a Caleb Dorsey triple on back-to-back possessions gave the Tribe the lead at 54-51 and forced a Drexel timeout with 9:21 to play. It felt like the moment that W&M could have taken full control of the game.
Instead, Drexel responded, taking a 55-54 lead on a Yame Butler turnaround from 10 feet with 8:05 left. But the momentum had shifted, with the season-high Kaplan Arena crowd of 5,103 now fully engaged. A 7-0 Tribe spurt, punctuated by a Malachi Ndur trey, gave W&M the lead for good. Lowe’s and-one bucket with 1:57 on the clock sealed the deal, delivering the Tribe a much-needed victory.
“It’s fun,” said Case, who tied his career high with 19 points in the game. “It’s stuff that you dream about as a kid, having a big crowd when you make a big play.”
The Tribe held Drexel to 16 points in the second half, one of its best defensive performances of the season. Just two of those points came in the final 7 minutes of the game.
W&M will look to carry over the defensive effort in another high-stakes CAA matchup, as UNCW comes to town Thursday. The Seahawks hold second-place in the league and have won nine consecutive contests. Kaplan will likely be rocking once again.
“[Kaplan is] a fun environment,” Earl said. “The students are out there, the community is out there. … I didn’t know it was here when I got here, but I’ve seen it build in other places. We’ve done well here at home.”