La Salle tops GW for 13th straight home victory

YOU CAN'T make everything. It says so right there in Dr. Naismith's original rulebook. Yet for the longest while last night at the Tom Gola Arena, La Salle sure gave it a shot.

At halftime, George Washington was hitting 57.7 percent from the field itself, 66.7 from the arc. And still trailed by 13 points. The margin grew to 20 with a little less than 15 minutes left, at which point the Explorers were still converting at a rate of a little more than 70 percent overall, 67 from three. Then, as can often happen, the numbers leveled off a little. Even so, La Salle's 57.7 from anywhere and 57.1 from deep were both season highs.

The final was 78-63. And in case you haven't paid close enough attention, the Explorers (15-6, 4-2 Atlantic 10) have matched their victory total from last season.

They're in a six-way scrum for first in the conference in the loss column. And they've won 13 in a row at home, the program's longest such streak since 1968-70. And in case you forget, that 1968-69 team, considered by many to be the best in Big 5 history, was ranked second in the country.

For a program that's mostly wandered in the wilderness these last 2 decades, it's all pretty good stuff.

"I'm not surprised by the success," said coach John Giannini said. "I was surprised by the lack of success the last two seasons. We underachieved. That always bothered me. But I knew these guys could be good.

"I want them to be mean dogs, the kind of dogs that scare you on the street. I want to be intimidating, disrupt the other team, get in their heads a little bit. I'd like us to strike some fear into people."

Junior Ramon Galloway, in his first season at 20th and Olney after transferring from South Carolina back home to Philly, had a career-high 28 points. He missed only once (11-for-12, 6-for-7). And his only attempt in the closing 15 minutes came in the last 30 seconds. OK, so he was the only Explorer to have multiple turnovers, finishing with four. But he also was largely responsible for limiting GW's top scorer, Tony Taylor, to seven points, half his average.

"I'm happy for [Galloway]," Giannini said. "But I'm not in love with him because he made very shot. I'm in love with him for his effort. We were very fortunate [in the first half]. We just couldn't stop them. We did a better job in the second half. Every good team has to be good defensively. You can't do it on offense alone. That's something you can't count on. It can come and go. It deviates from our values. The second half wasn't beautiful, but we grinded it out. It's what good teams do."

The Colonials (8-12, 3-3) had won their last three A-10 games, sandwiched around a loss at then-No. 25 Harvard. But they're now 1-8 on the road. And that win was at Bowling Green in late November.

"I remember [one stretch] when we had the best road record in the Atlantic 10 and couldn't win at home," Giannini said. "I was miffed by that. For every team that plays at a high level, that's not an option. A lot of [good] teams lose on the road. But being good at home is the most important thing a program has to do. It's necessary. Look at the top teams in our league: Temple, Xavier, Dayton. There are no shortcuts."

The Explorers will close out the month Saturday at Duquesne (12-8, 3-3). They'll visit GW on Feb. 29, in their final road trip. It's the fourth straight season they'll meet twice.

"Our mentality is to be pit bulls," said guard Earl Pettis, the team's only senior starter. "We want to come out and attack people, more on defense. As long as we stop the other team, we can win games. That's our motto, every day."

When you're en fuego at the other end, maybe it doesn't matter quite as much.

"When you play with four guards, somebody's going to get off," Galloway said. "It happened to be a good day for me. I was just trying to win the game, to be honest. Most of my shots came in the flow. My teammates found me, got me the open looks. There's no need for us to hunt shots.

"When we're playing together, it opens up a lot of doors. We're going to get some easy ones. We feed off each other."

And, as Pettis added, they have "a feel for each other." Which is probably more important. He added 15 points, which is his average. Jerrell Wright, the lone big man among the first five, had 12. It didn't seem to make much difference that Tyreek Duren (nine, to go with four steals) and Sam Mills (five, to go with six rebounds) were merely decent. Their tallest regular, 6-8 senior Devon White, missed his second game after taking a hit to the head in a one-point loss against Temple a week earlier. No problem. Steve Zack, a 6-11 freshman, responded to his 14 minutes with nine points (3-for-3). That's what good teams do, too.

Too bad more than 2,085 weren't there to see it. Maybe some acts simply take time to catch on. Nonetheless . . .

"Anytime you play in front of the home crowd, it gives you energy and excitement, especially for the young guys," Galloway said. "We feel comfortable at home."

Almost as if they couldn't miss. They'll play four of their last 10 there, including the Temple rematch on Feb. 22. For a change, they could have something worth defending.