The Hofstra University men’s basketball team reclaimed the Battle of Long Island with a gritty 67-58 defensive performance over Stony Brook University on Saturday, Feb. 28. With the victory, the Pride secured a top four seed in the Coastal Athletic Association (CAA), earning the elusive double-bye in the conference tournament.
The double-bye allows the top four seeds to skip the tournament’s first two rounds and avoid playing during the opening two days. This provides teams with two extra days of rest, but more importantly, two days where you cannot lose a game and become a chapter in another team’s fairy tale story.
Hofstra improved to 11-6 in CAA play and 20-10 overall, marking the fourth 20-win season in the last five years under head coach Speedy Claxton.
“[I’m] proud of the guys,” Claxton said. “Sometimes we got to win ugly. Tonight was gritty, not pretty. Offensively we kind of got bogged down, I think they did a terrific job on our two guards.”
Hofstra’s backcourt two-headed monster of Cruz Davis and Preston Edmead has been the engine of the team all season, but on Saturday night they were largely neutralized. Davis, the nation’s 15th-leading scorer, was held to just eight points on a tough 2-8 shooting performance from the field. It marked Davis’s second-lowest scoring output of the season, trailing only his seven-point outing earlier in the year – also against Stony Brook.
The other half of the duo, freshman standout Edmead, managed to break through the offensive struggles a bit better than his counterpart. Edmead finished with 14 points on an inefficient 3-8 shooting night. The freshman guard also found himself in early foul trouble, playing with three fouls most of the game.
Basketball is a next-man-up sport, and Claxton and company have found valuable depth throughout the roster. Four-year program veteran German Plotnikov stepped up in a big way with the team struggling offensively. The guard from Belarus opened the game shooting hot, starting 3-3 from the field and accounting for all eight of the Pride’s early points. Plotnikov finished with 15 points and seven rebounds, all of which came in the second half.
The biggest spark for Hofstra came off the bench, as Biggie Patterson led the way to victory. Patterson poured in a game-high 17 points, knocking down four shots from beyond the arc. He was also dominant on the glass, grabbing 10 rebounds to record a double-double.
“[Patterson] came in and held down the fort,” Claxton said. “That’s what we expect from [him]. This is what we envisioned when we signed him last spring. We need him to be that third guy. When he plays like that, we’re a different team.”
The Pride finally broke their four-game losing streak to Stony Brook in the Battle of Long Island.
Hofstra has one more regular season CAA game remaining at home against Drexel University on Tuesday, March 3, at the David S. Mack Sports and Exhibition Complex. Tip-off is set for 7 p.m.
