The Hoyas defeated Coppin State in a hard fought battle on Tuesday night, winning in overtime by a score of 99-89. Although Spears led the way with 28 points, the Hoyas put forth a team effort (with four players playing at least 40 minutes) supplemented by multiple new players who look to become key parts of what hopes to be a new and improved Georgetown squad.
As Ewing enters his sixth season as head coach, he brings in a variety of incoming pieces, and with that, a lot of questions as to who will play and to what extent. Georgetown came out with a starting five of all new transfers (Spears, Murray, Mozone, Akok and Wahab), as was expected with Dante Harris currently out for “personal reasons” and Jay Heath waiting on his waiver from the NCAA. The Hoyas kept their rotation relatively short to start the first half, playing just six players through the first twelve or so minutes until Denver Anglin checked in and immediately made his presence felt by taking a charge. Although Anglin, Mutombo, and Riley would all see the floor in limited fashion, it was the same six players who saw the vast majority of playing time.
Interestingly enough, Georgetown came out of the gates defensively with a full court press. We saw them employ this last year, particularly when down late in games, but today, that press was used from the very start. Although sometimes useful as a last ditch effort in the past, the press proved to be futile, allowing a Coppin State team who shot just 3-22 from three in their first game to knock down 13 triples in this one, most of them wide open.
During the first half, aside from a few positive sequences, the Hoyas seemed to struggle to get going offensively. Wayne Bristol came in for Qudus Wahab just two minutes into the game due to early foul trouble, which stalled the offense for much of the first half and prevented Georgetown from truly punishing them inside in a meaningful way.
Despite their efforts to get out quickly in transition and up the tempo, the Hoyas struggled to get much of anything going in transition in the first half, as well. Brandon Murray wasted no time getting in on the action, however, and looked relatively comfortable from the get-go, giving Georgetown a much needed scoring boost early. Despite this, his four first half turnovers allowed the Eagles to hang around late in the half.
As the second half rolled around, Coppin State continued to hang in there, taking a lead just a few minutes in with a fastbreak dunk from Kam’Ron Blue. The Hoyas continued to kill the Eagles on the boards, just as they did in the first half, despite the score remaining tight. Back-to-back threes from Sessoms and Nendah Tarke gave Coppin State a 6-point lead going into the final ten minutes of the contest as Hoya fans watched in fear of another tragic loss. Following this, the Hoyas seemed panicked, losing a couple of head shaking turnovers, but that panic quickly turned into urgency, spurring a 6-0 run that carried them over into the final minutes, in which both teams would trade blows.
Despite their lack of size, the Eagles were not afraid to be physical on the interior, and made it difficult for the Hoyas to finish in the paint on multiple occasions. Numerous Georgetown fouls allowed Coppin State to enter the bonus early, and with just four minutes left, Wahab fouled out, leaving the Hoyas without a true center for the rest of the game. After two missed free throws from Murray, the Eagles missed the mark on a three in the closing seconds, only to gather their miss and hit a buzzer beating three to silence the crowd and send the game to overtime.
Instead of giving Coppin State the momentum, however, the Hoyas bounced back in a big way in overtime, combining a sequence of buckets and stops that peaked with a Spears’ steal-and-score and-1 bucket that had the entire stadium rocking. The home team never looked back, and came away with the victory in their season-opener.
Although it was a sloppy game overall, there were multiple bright spots for the Hoyas. Akok Akok certainly lived up to the preseason hype, putting up 18 points, 12 rebounds, and a whopping 5 blocks, all while shooting a very efficient 7-9 from the field. Aside from the gaudy numbers on the stat sheet, he showed an incredible amount of effort and hustle on both ends of the floor, and flashed his defensive versatility on a late-game sequence in which he switched onto Sessoms and shut him down, forcing a turnover on the perimeter. Ewing, in his postgame press conference, was not shy in complementing Akok, calling tonight’s game a “coming out party” for him.
In addition, Bryson Mozone poured in a quiet 20 points on 50% shooting from the field. Wahab, in his first game back in a Georgetown uniform after a year at Maryland, also helped to expose the opponent’s lack of size, as he managed to chip in a double-double with 11 points and 11 rebounds in just 15 minutes on the floor. But perhaps the biggest star from the night was Duquesne transfer Primo Spears. In the first half, he took the ball to the basket early and often, but didn’t see his shots fall in the way that he would’ve hoped. Spears showed up big down the stretch, however, scoring 16 in the second half, including three huge buckets with under two minutes, as well as two free throws to put the Hoyas up five with 25.9 seconds in regulation. In overtime, he added another six, giving him a team-high 28 points overall in what was a fantastic opening game for him.
At the end of the day, it wasn’t as emphatic as we would have hoped, but the Hoyas came away with a much-needed opening night win, and ended their streak of 328 days without a win. They will look to carry this momentum into Saturday when they take on Green Bay at home.
