Drexel wins 17th straight, 73-72, over Old Dominion

NORFOLK, Va. - Bruiser Flint was not equipped to win a battle of attrition.

Seven deep at full strength, his Drexel team was playing a man down because of the suspension of starter Derrick Thomas.

So as the fouls piled up Saturday, in Drexel's 73-72 win over Old Dominion, the Drexel coach, already wearing a groove in the floor in front of his bench, paced even more.

Big man Darryl McCoy had just picked up his fourth foul, and there were more than 10 minutes to play.

About a minute later, the Dragons' other big, Dartaye Ruffin, picked up his fourth.

Finessing the foul trouble, overcoming the absence of Thomas, the Dragons did what they've done most of the season, and toughed it out.

Drexel hung on to extend its school-record winning streak to 17 and claim the CAA regular-season title outright.

The Dragons (25-5, 16-2 CAA) had already wrapped up the No. 1 seed in next week's conference tournament. Drexel may need to win it to get the league's automatic bid since the conference is not expected by many NCAA bracket analysts to get an at-large bid.

Drexel has a bye into Saturday's CAA quarterfinals.

"We just kept battling all year," Flint said. "We thought we could be pretty good. I didn't say I thought we could win 16 straight league games to be honest with you."

Drexel needed all 40 minutes to do it. Up six with 35 seconds to play, the Dragons saw their lead cut to one when Dimitri Batten converted a three-point play with 17 seconds left.

A pair of free throws by Chris Fouch (15 points) pushed the lead to three with 10 seconds remaining. But Damion Lee fouled Old Dominion's Kent Bazemore on a three-point attempt with 0.7 seconds left. Bazemore hit the first two, but missed the third, and Drexel escaped.

"Every time they made a run, we just had to counteract it, and tough it out," Lee said.

Drexel led by six at the half and answered every ODU surge in the second half. Lee and Fouch led the way, combining for 20 second-half points.

The Dragons also absorbed a 37-point performance from Bazemore, the preseason player of the year in the CAA.

"He was on fire tonight, he made everything," Flint said.

Lee, who led Drexel with 24 points, was tasked with trying to slow the 6-foot-5 Bazemore, who made 12 of 23 field goals and 11 of 15 free throws.

"I tried to make him take tough shots," Lee said. "Some of them fell."

But so did many of Lee's. He hit 6 of 12 three-pointers, 3 of 5 in the second half.

Fouch, who couldn't buy a three early, got a big one to fall with 2:16 left that gave the Dragons a five-point lead.

Afterward in the interview room, the sophomore guard broke down when asked about what it meant to win the regular-season title. The Dragons were picked to win in the preseason, but got off to an 0-2 conference start.

"We just worked so hard," he said. "You don't know what we went through."

Said Lee: "Everyone thought that we weren't what people expected us to be. . . . I feel like we actually found ourselves, you know?"