At first it was a seesaw contest that saw the Freedom Conference’s worst club putting a potential playoff team on the ropes early.
Sophomore Donte Ali would carve his way to the lane for a bucket, but Tim O’Shea would counter with a stand-alone triple or a sweet post move on the weak side of the court.
Senior Kevin Furlong would call for an isolation at the top of the key and drain one. Then Chris Fazzini would answer back. It was blow for blow. Tick for tack. Shot for shot until the Monarchs would finally pull away at home for the 11th time this season for an 86-74 win over FDU-Florham.
“Everything we do starts at the defensive end,” head coach J.P. Andrejko said following the win. “We changed defenses and we made a bunch of mental mistakes with it. So at halftime, we came in, we went back to our man-to-man. We said ‘let’s just play it, knock off anything cute and let’s do this right…’ We eliminated the mental mistakes, we kept it more solid and that led to some good offense.”
The second half became a completely different display. It was the Dan Rutecki show. The sophomore forward and last season’s Rookie of the Year led King’s (11-9 overall, 4-5 Freedom) with a career-high 28 points.
Their 86 total points, was the squad’s highest scoring total of the season, their largest (87) coming against Pennsylvania College of Technology in the Susquehanna season tip-off tournament.
O’Shea tallied 16 points in 22 minutes and Chris and John Fazzini combined for 32 points on 10-for-17 shooting with three triples. It was a total team effort and it came from the midseason changes Andrejko changed.
It’s become the biggest difference maker for the shaky Monarch club.
“The thing with this team is that it’s going to continuously change,” Andrejko said. “Things that are happening now, a lot of that is because of things in the first half of the year. I will change as much as I need to [help this team].”
Early in the second half, Andrejko screamed for a timeout and wasn’t awarded one and tangibly was irate. Later, the same happened when O’Shea was crowded on the sideline but he found Rutecki for a bucket. He shrugged it off, gave a firm clap and paraded around his team.
The plan was simple. The execution came beautifully and King’s looked dominant for the first time, in a long time during a shaky season in tough Freedom Conference play.
The wins won’t come easily for a club that allowed Ali to hit 21 points and managed to give up double digit scoring to four Devil players, but the will come eventually.
And when it does happen, the Monarchs could be playing for a title again. If the changes aren’t soon, they could fade into obscurity. But with a dominating win like Wednesday’s the former is more anticipated than the latter. For the time being.
“Honestly with this group, I don’t know what tomorrow will bring,” Andrejko laughed. “It’s a roller coaster with them…they are just so young, that the consistency is impossible to get. It’s getting better. But it’s impossible.”
Tyler R. Tynes covers King’s sports for WRKC Digital, follow him on Twitter @TylerRickyTynes or email him at TylerTynes@Kings.edu