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| Josh Blamon had a huge night
at Cabrini. Richard Stockton athletics file photo |
By Rob Knox
D3sports.com
Gerry Matthews’ trademark white shoes are perfect for any occasion, but more so during the month of March when he can go dancing. The venerable Richard Stockton coach has roamed many of sidelines during his 41 years of combined coaching in high school and college and seen many things throughout his distinguished career.
The latest spectacle witnessed by Matthews was his team’s 85-76 road victory over No. 4 Cabrini last week in a second round contest. He is enjoying the ride and the opportunity to put his white shoes again Friday night when the high-flying Ospreys (25-4 overall) battle Morrisville State in a Sweet 16 sectional contest at Amherst. The other contest features Plattsburgh State against Amherst. The two winners will meet Saturday night for a trip to Salem.
The win over Cabrini is definitely in the top five of my coaching career,” Matthews said. “I would sort out a couple of other wins because there’s been some pretty good wins. We upset Jersey City in 1990 in the NCAA tournament and I thought they were a better team overall than Cabrini. For the last three years Cabrini has been so good, so it was definitely a nice win for our program. Aaron Walton-Moss is the best Division III player we’ve seen in a number of years.”
Richard Stockton’s Josh Blamon was just as special last Saturday against the Cavs. He shot 11-for-18 (61 percent) from the field and poured in a career-high 31 points while also grabbing a team-high nine rebounds. Three more Ospreys reached double figures starting with Kevin Johnson who tossed in 15 markers and tied his career high with eight rebounds and dished five assists. Nnamdi Usuwa went 4-5 from the floor and 4-5 at the line for an efficient 12 points while Rich Suhr netted 10 points.
Defensively, Stockton forced 15 turnovers and converted them into 21 points. Prior to the game, Cabrini had been 70-1 at home since the start of the 2009-10 season. The Ospreys can earn some revenge for the NJAC if it can beat Morrisville State. Members of the North Eastern Athletic Conference, Morrisville State eliminated Ramapo in last year’s tournament by rallying from a double-digit deficit to win.
The Ospreys weren’t intimidated entering the Cabrini contest because they had been hardened by playing in the rugged New Jersey Athletic Conference during the year. Playing in the NJAC is like running across the New Jersey Turnpike in heavy traffic. Sometimes you’ll make it to the other side unscathed, but mostly you’ll get hit by a speeding car a time or two. The Ospreys, who lost three conference games this year, had an entertaining battle royale with Rutgers-Newark and William Paterson this season for NJAC supremacy.
Because those three teams battled and beat up on each other, the perception was that the NJAC had lost its swagger from the 1990s and early part of the 2000s when schools like Trenton State, Rowan, Richard Stockton and Montclair State were consistently among the nation’s best and competing for national titles. Then add to that, the recent showings in NCAA Tournaments, where the NJAC schools went winless from 2010 to 2013, and it was easy to dismiss the conference.
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| Richard Stockton athletics photo |
“We think our league is pretty good,” Matthews said. “During my 28 years here, I can’t remember a team going through the league undefeated. It happens in other leagues where teams go undefeated and are rarely challenged. That just doesn’t happen in our league because it’s more eveness and a balanced conference.”
The NJAC has been hurt in recent years by the growth of four Division II schools in the state: Bloomfield, Caldwell, Felician and Georgian Court, when there used to be just one (NJIT, which moved to Division I). Those schools have taken away top tier talent that used to be spread out among many of the NJAC schools. There are still quality players in the NJAC now, but coaches are competing against more schools for the same players.
Even with those Division II schools in the state, Stockton has remained a consistent winner. The Ospreys have won at least 20 games in six of the last seven years. They lost in the 2009 national title game to Washington U., 61-52. Stockton was one of the top programs in the nation, but it had little to show for its consistent excellence in recent years, winning 20, 16, 20 and 21 games since then.
The last two years, the Ospreys were on the outside looking in when it came to Selection Monday. This season, they left little to chance by storming to the NJAC postseason crown to earn the conference’s automatic bid. Richard Stockton is taking its opportunity to keep playing and embracing the chance as it has stretched its winning streak to 10 games.
“It does feel good to be back in the Sweet 16,” Matthews said. “We always thought that the last two years we may have been the team that was left out. You think you’re close and then you don’t get a bid to the tournament is hard. We thought Paterson deserved a bid this year. Playing into March is what we strive for and it is one of our goals. Sometimes, you don’t get to them.”
This season’s Stockton squad is a wonderful throwback to an era of Matthews’ youth where players wore short shorts with belts and Converse canvas high-top sneakers. Seriously, the Ospreys have utilized a team approach to help them reach this point of the season. The Richard Stockton trademark this season has been bringing its lunch pail and hard hat each day to the gym and playing hard for all 40 minutes.
Blamon, a junior forward, leads the Ospreys with a 17.5 point per game scoring average. He has scored in double figures 24 times and is averaging 25.2 points through Richard Stockton’s two tournament contests. Blamon’s scored at least 20 or more points 10 times this season.
“Josh has become a real good player for us,” Mathews said. “I don’t remember 30 points. We’re usually a little more balanced than that, but he’s come through for us.”
Nnamdi Usuwa is Stockton’s other double-digit scorer (11.5 points per game). He also averages 7.1 rebounds per contest. Usuwa has scored in double figures 18 times and posted six double-doubles, including a monster 24 point, 14-rebound performance against Montclair State.
However, the Ospreys feature a quartet of players averaging at least nine points and who are capable of detonating for big points at any moment: Suhr, Rameel Johnson, Williams and Johnson. Suhr burned Bowdoin for 18 points in the opening round victory.
That balanced, disciplined and team approach will be crucial for the Ospreys as they attempt to extend their season. Matthews has had one encounter with Amherst and it’s one he’d rather forget.
“We played them ... in a tournament game and we fell behind, 17-0,” Matthews said. “I can’t remember when I was ever down 17-0 to begin a game. That’s the only time I had anything to do with Amherst.”
The Ospreys would love to create a different memory in Amherst this time around and give Matthews another reason to wear the white shoes for another week.