Dons knock off Broncos in opener

By Tom Schreier

What initially seemed like a sure win for Santa Clara transformed into desperation for the Broncos Saturday night. Racing back in the final minutes of the game, Santa Clara fought to start West Coast Conference play with a winning record, but the University of San Francisco prevailed 74-67.

Trailing 65-57 with just over three minutes left to play, Santa Clara sophomore guard Kevin Foster pulled up for one of his signature threes. Seconds after it left his hands, the ball casually drifted through the net; the fibers whipped together as the ball fell to the floor.

Foster's three consecutive three-point shots dropped within a minute-and-a-half of each other and gave Santa Clara the lead it had relinquished five minutes into the second half.

"I had confidence in my shot," Foster said following the contest. "I know I'm supposed to take the shot at the end of the game because that's what [my team is] looking for from me."

After being lulled into doldrums by the team's poor second half performance, the Leavey Center was suddenly ecstatic.

However, within a minute USF was up by five again.

"When you have a lead you have to go down and get a stop," Bronco Head Coach Kerry Keating said following the game. "You got to be able to stop them on defense. We didn't do that."

Members of the crowd who had made the trip from San Francisco began chanting, "U-S-F, U-S-F!" It appeared that the Dons' superstar guard, sophomore Michael Williams, had put the Broncos away with less than a minute left to play.

In unison the Santa Clara Ruff Rider section returned fire: "S-C-U, S-C-U!"

However, Santa Clara could not capitalize on the crowd's energy. Freshman guard Evan Roquemore tried to take over late in the game, but ended up burning time off the clock before missing a contested shot.

Once again the Broncos failed to deliver late in a game.

Early in the 206th meeting between the Bay Area rivals, Santa Clara looked like they were going to humiliate the University of San Francisco.

Santa Clara went up 9-0 two minutes into the game following three pointers from Foster and sophomore guard Ray Cowels. By the 11:50 mark they were up by 11 and at halftime they were up 35-24.

"We got complacent, didn't communicate in transition, didn't rebound well enough, let them get comfortable, [and] pressed the issue a little bit," said Keating. "We couldn't find anyone who could get the ball inside to get a post touch or get to the free throw line."

The silver lining in the game was Kevin Foster, who thrived in front of a big crowd.

Foster's eight threes tied the school record shared by Steve Nash at Gonzaga on January 19, 1995, and Mitch Buley against Nevada on December 14, 1988. His 20 attempted three-pointers broke the school record set by Buley in the same contest.

"Nothing matters individually if we don't win," said Foster. "The whole team needs to make stops, it's not just a single person."

"We played very complacent to start the second half. They scored 24 points in the first half and 50 in the second half - you can't win letting teams do that."

Unfortunately, Foster has had limited opportunity to play in front of a sellout crowd.

Despite Keating's efforts to schedule big-name programs like Rice, UC-Santa Barbara and Washington State, Santa Clara's average home attendance of 1,706 is nearly 700 less than the league average of 2,437; the Leavy Center seats 4,500, meaning the arena is usually at 37.9 percent capacity for home games.

The Broncos were content to lean on their three-point shooting throughout the game; their 37 three-point attempts set a facility record.

"You can't win a game shooting 37 threes against a three-possession zone the whole game," said Keating. "It's not like they were in a zone and we had to shoot from the outside."

Santa Clara was 9-32 from the field in the second half and finished the game at 35.6 percent. They were 13-21 from the line and were outrebounded 44-34.

Conversely, the Dons shot 47.1 percent and got to the line 35 times, converting 21 of their free throws (60.0 percent).

Roquemore and Foster struggled to get the ball to junior forward Marc Trasolini, the team's strongest player inside the paint. Trasolini only had eight field goal attmpts and connected on half of them. He finished the night with 11 points.

"We need to get some inside presence and just because [sophomore forward] Chris [Cunningham] is out doesn't mean that the whole thing is out the window," said Keating. "Marc, Ben (Dowdell), Niyi (Harrison) and John (McArthur) need to be ready to step up and give us some inside presence."

Cunningham missed the game for currently unknown reasons.

Santa Clara travels to San Diego and St. Mary's before facing Gonzaga at home on January 20. The game will be televised on ESPNU.

Contact Tom Schreier at tschreier@scu.edu or at (408) 551-1918.