W&M Returns Home to Battle Drexel

The Green and Gold will host the Dragons on Wednesday, Feb. 20, at 7 p.m.

02/19/08 6:00PM

Williamsburg - After a three-game road trip, the William and Mary men’s basketball team returns to the friendly confines of Kaplan Arena to host Drexel on Wednesday, Feb. 20, at 7 p.m. It will be the first of three Tribe home games over the final four contests of the 2007-08 regular season. The tilt will also mark the second time this season that W&M and Drexel have faced off after the Tribe tallied a 73-72 overtime win in Philadelphia on Jan. 23.

The Tribe is coming off its third straight road setback on Feb. 16, falling to Towson, 64-52. Sophomore David Schneider led the Tribe with 13 points on 3-of-5 from 3-point range to go along with six rebounds. Freshman Marcus Kitts provided a spark off the bench for the College with eight points and five rebounds. Drexel has won two of its last three contests, following a 62-60 win at Delaware on Feb. 16. Frank Elegar led the Dragons with 22 points and 11 rebounds.

Fans can catch the action on the Tribe Radio Network with Jay Colley, Bill McDonald and Charlie Woollum on the call. The contest can also be heard over the Internet at TribeAthletics.com. Live stats for the game will be available on the home for W&M Athletics as well.

For complete W&M men's basketball notes, click HERE.

Story lines
- W&M will play its first home game in two weeks after spending the last three games on the road, while Drexel is wrapping up a three-game road trip with its third contest in a week.

- The Tribe will look to garner its 10th league victory, marking only the second time in school history that W&M has won 10 or more CAA games.

Scouting Drexel
The Dragons enter the game with the Tribe near the bottom of the CAA standings, but have been playing some of their best basketball as of late. Drexel has won two of its last three games and could very easily have won all three of those contests. After a 65-51 home victory over Towson, the Dragons dropped a tight 75-71 double-overtime game at Old Dominion on Feb. 14. Drexel bounced back two days later with a 62-60 victory on the road at Delaware.

The game with W&M will be the Dragons’ third road game in a week. Drexel is currently 11-16 overall and 4-11 in the CAA under the direction of seventh-year head coach Bruiser Flint. In the victory over Delaware, the Dragons led most of the way, before a late jumper by Randy Oveneke gave Drexel the lead for good. Senior Frank Elegar led the Dragons charge with his ninth double-double of the season on 22 points and 11 rebounds. Scott Rodgers finished with 16 points in the victory, while Tramayne Hawthorne chipped in 11.

Elegar was a Preseason First-Team All-CAA selection and leads the Dragons, while ranking among the CAA leaders in points (15.1), rebounds (8.3) and blocks (1.9) per game. He ranks 10th in the league in scoring, while rankings third in blocked shots and fourth in both rebounding and field goal percentage (57.1 percent). Elegar was the driving force behind the Dragons offense against the Tribe in Philadelphia earlier this season, recording a double-double with 24 points and 15 rebounds.

Hawthorne is Drexel’s top long range shooter, connecting on 34.3 percent from 3-point range. He ranks second on the team in points at 11.3 per game, while leading the squad in assists at 3.2 per game. Hawthorne also ranks fifth in the CAA in assist-to-turnover ratio at 1.92. Rodgers has been on a tear as of late for the Dragons and is averaging 9.3 points per game. He has averaged 15 points per game over the last four contests and tallied 16 against W&M the last time the two teams met.

Drexel Series History
Drexel leads the all-time series at 14-4 against the Tribe, but the Green and Gold has won two of the last three contests, including a 73-72 overtime win in Philadelphia earlier this season. In the game in Philly, the Tribe connected on 14 3-point field goals to tally its first road overtime victory since 1998. The win was also the College’s first-ever in Philadelphia. Seniors Nathan Mann and Laimis Kisielius led the way for W&M with a combined 38 points. Mann scored 18 on six 3-point field goals, while Kisielius led W&M with 20 points, including a 4-of-6 effort from long range. The Dragons had won 12 straight in the series and every game since joining the CAA in 2001-02 prior to the College’s 60-47 win in Williamsburg a season ago. Drexel also leads the series in Williamsburg at 5-3.

Home Sweet Home
After a grueling three-game road trip, the Tribe will play three of its final four regular season games in the friendly confines of Kaplan Arena in Williamsburg. The College will play back-to-back home contests against Drexel on Feb. 20 and Loyola-Chicago on Feb. 23. After a road game at George Mason on Feb. 27, the Tribe will wrap up the regular-season slate with Senior Night on Saturday, March 1.

W&M has enjoyed the home court advantage this season, racking up an 8-3 ledger at Kaplan Arena. In fact, the Tribe has won five of its last six games at home. Over the last two seasons, W&M is 19-8 (.704) in Kaplan Arena. The 19 home victories are the most for the College over a two-year stretch since W&M won 20 combined in 1996-97 (eight) and 1997-98 (12). The Tribe has a shot to win double-digit home games in back-to-back seasons for the first time in 23 years. The last time Tribe accomplished the feat it won 10 games at home during both the 1983-84 and 1984-85 campaigns.

Longball Records Set to Fall
The Tribe has relied heavily on the 3-point shot during the 2007-08 campaign and in the process, has already bettered the school-record mark for 3-pointers made in a season. With its seven longballs against Towson, W&M upped his season total of 3-pointers to 201, which bettered the record of 200 set last season. More impressive than bettering the mark is the fact that the Tribe did it in five less games and 57 fewer attempts than a season ago.

The College is also on pace to shatter the high water mark for treys attempted in a season as well. Last season, W&M attempted 624 3-pointers, but at its currently pace of 22.7 3-pointers per game, W&M is set to attempt a record 658 from long range during the regular season. The Tribe’s 567 attempts from 3-point range already rank as the third highest total in school history.

This season, W&M is knocking down over eight 3-pointers a game, which tops the CAA and ranks 52nd nationally. W&M is hitting at a high rate from long range, shooting 35.4 percent. The percentage is the highest for the College since 1996. During that campaign, W&M shot 36.8 percent from 3-point range. The Tribe’s per game average of 8.04 would also establish a new school record and is over one 3-pointer per game better than the previous mark of 6.93 set in 1998.

Seniors Vital to Success
It has long been said that experience is an important factor in success of college teams, and that statement rings true in the Tribe basketball program as well. Senior captains Laimis Kisielius and Nathan Mann were part of head coach Tony Shaver’s first recruiting class at the College along with Kyle Carrabine and fellow captain Chris Stratton. Kisielius and Mann have both been starters throughout their four years in Williamsburg, and the 2007-08 version of W&M basketball relies heavily on their senior leadership.

The success of the Tribe hangs in the production of both Kisielius and Mann in numerous ways, but none more evident than their offensive contributions. Both players have led W&M in scoring on a team-high seven occasions, and the duo has led W&M in scoring during nine of the team’s 13 wins this season, including seven of its last eight wins. Comparing the pair’s numbers between wins and losses, Mann and Kisielius shoot 43.8 percent from the floor and 46.5 percent from 3-point range, while averaging a combined 24.9 points per game in W&M victories. In Green and Gold setbacks, the duo’s numbers drop to 33 percent from the field, 30 percent from 3-point range and 17.5 points per game.

Youthful Development
The 2007-08 version of Tribe basketball is the deepest and most experienced group that fifth-year head coach Tony Shaver has enjoyed during his tenure. While the Tribe freshman class came in as one of the most heralded under Shaver, the group found it challenging to get time on the court in the early part of their freshmen seasons. Despite the slow start, freshmen John Sexton and Marcus Kitts continued to develop under the Tribe coaching staff, and toward the later part of the 2007-08 campaign, the pair is making an impact.

Sexton leads the Tribe rookies in games played (22) and is averaging 10.6 minutes per contest. He is one of the Tribe’s top threats from long range, shooting 45.5 percent from 3-point range. He is averaging 2.6 points per game this season and earlier in the month of February, he erupted for a career-best 15 points in a 70-66 victory over UNC Wilmington in Williamsburg. For his efforts, Sexton garnered CAA Rookie of the Week honors on Feb. 4.

Kitts has only appeared in 10 games for the Tribe, but with an injury to sophomore bigman Steven Hess, the Holly Springs, N.C., native stepped right into the rotation without missing a beat. Over the last two teams, Kitts has averaged seven points and 3.5 rebounds off the bench for the College. In the Green and Gold’s most recent game at Towson, Kitts turned in an eight-point, five-rebound performance against the Tigers. Both totals ranked second on the squad.