Before Saturday’s 83-63 blowout win over Huston-Tillotson University, the 2-1 Wolfpack hadn’t been above .500 since the 2004-05 season – coach Michael Giorlando’s first.
But by utilizing a seldom-seen 13-man rotation and wave after wave of balanced attacks, Loyola repeated the feat and secured its second straight win and its first winning streak of the season.
“We’ve been emphasizing unselfish play. We brought in two units – our maroon and gold units – and proved that we have 13 guys that can play,” Giorlando, who had nine players score multiple baskets, said.
With Carter Wurts returning from injury, Giorlando added that he hadn’t exposed the rotation because of hurt players. “We’re finally healthy. It’s something we’ve been working on since the beginning. We had a lot of new guys and we’re at a point, with six games under their belt, that I feel comfortable giving them more minutes.”
Psychology junior guard Luke Zumo again spearheaded Loyola’s scoring, amassing 16 points on 6-of-11 shooting and two three-pointers.
“We had the whole week off and five good practices. We executed well on both ends and now we hope to carry it into Tuesday,” Zumo said, looking forward to the Wolfpack’s Tuesday “Battle of Freret Street” with Tulane.
Finance junior forward Mario Faranda contributed 14 points in support and hauled down four boards. He authored the game’s most exciting play with less than a minute left in the first half – Faranda wheeled down the baseline, collected a bounce pass from accounting senior James Bunn and thundered down a two-handed dunk that electrified the matinee crowd.
“It was a good message before the half. We wanted to make it clear that we had home court advantage and let them know we were going to seal the deal in the second half,” Faranda said.
Loyola sped off to a 15-4 lead, mostly behind three offensive rebounds from general business freshman Nick Tuszynski. Two of them went for put-back buckets and he set up history sophomore Torry Beaulieu for a three-point ball with the third.
“That’s who he is,” Giorlando said of Tuszynski, who led the team with 10 rebounds. “He’s a garbage collector taking care of business.”
Though Huston-Tillotson opted for a full court trap so as to generate easy baskets off turnovers in Loyola’s court, the Wolfpack’s ball handlers never panicked, easily breaking the press and scoring unchallenged buckets on the thinly-spread Huston-Tillotson defense.
Four players scored eight points (Tuszynski, Beaulieu, Wurts and general business freshman Sean Bennett, who hit 2-of-3 three-pointers); marketing freshman Matt McCabe had 7, and two had six points (Bunn and political science junior David Curtin).
Marketing freshman McArthur Strickland, Loyola’s only other scorer, tallied two points.
In the second half, the ‘Pack quickly established a 55-35 lead after McCabe rolled in a kilometric three-point ball from a Strickland miss. McCabe then established Loyola’s largest lead of the game at 83-53 after acrobatically finishing a fastbreak.
Titus Butler led Huston-Tillotson with 16 points. Justin Phillips (13 points) and KC Asomugha (10 points) were Huston-Tillotson’s other scorers in double figures.
NOTES:
–The game tipped off about a half-hour late because Huston-Tillotson’s bus got delayed by an accident on the Causeway.
–The Wolfpack Nation’s promotion was “Disco Night” and they played a number of pop king Michael Jackson’s best-known hits from the late 70s and early 80s.
On the day’s most humorous moment, a Huston-Tillotson guard/forward named Michael Jackson hit a pair of free throws; Loyola called a timeout and the music system blared “Don’t Stop ‘Til You Get Enough.”
Ramon Vargas can be reached at [email protected].
