Langborg thinking 3 for Princeton
PRINCETON » Ryan Langborg knew the ball was coming his way and all he had to do was make sure he got enough separation to get a shot off.
Make or miss, Langborg, Princeton’s best 3-point shooter, was going to let it fly.
“We drew it up and it went exactly according to plan,” Langborg said after the Tigers rallied to defeat Drexel in overtime last week.
Princeton, of course, wouldn’t have been in overtime if Langborg hadn’t made the 3-pointer — his fifth of the game — with 26.4 seconds remaining that tied the score.
Let’s go inside the play: Drew Friberg inbounds the ball from in front of the Tigers’ bench and Jaelin Llewellyn sets a screen for Ethan Wright underneath the basket so Wright can pop out on the far side of the court.
The crosscourt pass from a side-out is an action coach Mitch Henderson likes often. Sometimes the option is for Wright to run all the way out to the 3-point line to catch and shoot. On this occasion, the simultaneous action is for Langborg to bring his defender toward the sideline and then run him off a screen from the 6-foot-8 Tosan Evbuomwan.
“(My defender) kind of bit when I came off the first side and Tosan hit him perfectly on the second screen and their big was a little late coming up,” Langborg said. “Right when it went off my hand, I had a good feeling.”
Langborg still had to get the ball over the close out of a 6-foot-10 defender.
“I thought he put a little bit more arc on it than normal,” coach Mitch Henderson said, “which was incredible.”
Langborg is averaging 12.8 points and connecting
at a team-best 46.6% from beyond the arc (27for-58), but that game-saving 3-pointer isn’t possible without his quick release.
“Before school with my dad and he would throw me bad passes at my feet and it was like catch it and how can you get it to your shooting
pocket as quick as possible,” Langborg said. “When you can get that off quicker, it makes everything else come a lot easier.