Rebounding remains key for Nagy, Raiders
Coach puts emphasis on defense, as Raiders prep for league-leaders.
Wright State’s Scott FAIRBORN—
Nagy is anold-school coach, building his program on intensity and competitive fifire rather than some newfangled offffffffffffense.
Those traits showupmostoften inrebounding stats. Andthat’s the fifirst place he looks after a game to gauge his team’s performance.
“I know in the history of my coaching career, which is starting toget fairly long, I’ve only hadone game where we out-rebounded a teamby 20 and lost — and it’s one of two times where I felt like we absolutely got cheated by the offifficials,” saidNagy, who is inhisfififth year with the Raiders and 26th year overall.
“Inever saythat (about therefs). But Iknowifwewin(the rebounding margin) by 20, we’re going to win the game for sure. Almost always, if you win by 10, you’re going to win the game.”
The Raiders bludgeoned Youngstown State on the boards, 51-29, on their way 93-55 victory Saturday, avenging a two-point defeat to the Penguins about 20 hours earlier.
That was one of many positive signs for the preseason Horizon
League favorites, whowouldhave put themselves indangerof falling out of the conference race with another setback.
They’re 8-3 overall and 6-2 in theleague, twogamesbehindfifirstplace Cleveland State, which is a surprising 8-0 — their best start since joining the league in 1995.
The Vikings, who beat NorthernKentucky inovertime athome Saturday behindTrotwood-Madison grad Torrey Patton’s 18 points and 12 rebounds, visit theRaiders for a pair of games this weekend.
“I think we’re in a really good spot,” said Wright State’s Tanner Holden, who is averaging a team-best 17.1 points. “There are always things to work on. Definitely, defense is something we need to work on. I think we can be a great defensive team.
“Coach talks about that every game.He’stryingtogetinourheads that defense wins ball games, not offffffffffffense. If we do that, we’ll be a really, really special team.”
The Raiders are trending in the
right direction. They have a plus-9.5 rebound margin per game, and they’re averaging 80.1 points while giving up just 66.1, leading the league in all three categories.
They’re also finally developing some depth. Though theyplayedwithoutthree-year starterJaylonHallonSaturday — Nagy labeledHall’s absence a “coach’s decision,” which meanssomething other than a health reason — they put six players in double figures.
Holden had 24 points, Loudon Love 15 and Grant Basile and Tim Finke 11 each, while subs Alex Huibregtse and JamesManns hit season highs in scoring with 12 and 11, respectively.
Andrew Welage, a freshman backcourt reserve like Huibregtse, played 14 minutes and had two points, two assists and five rebounds.
“We have to get those guys some minutes becausewe’re going to need them,” Nagy said. “We played our guys a lot ofminutes (Friday). Idon’t want to do that, particularly on these back-to-backs.”
Manns has been noticeably under-utilized — especially with his scoring prowess. The6-7 juniorwas instant offenselastseason, tallying142 points in 195 minutes (that’s an average of 29.1 points per 40 minutes).
“We’ve been telling James, ‘You’regoingtoseemoretime. We need you to get comfortable.’ Andhopefullyhe will,” Nagy said. “The biggest thing we want him to focus on — whichiseveryone—isdefense.
“They’ll getmore comfortable on defense the more minutes they play, and it was important that all those guys got minutes in the first half. Those are very valuable minutes.”
The visit from Cleveland State normally would have the Nutter Center rocking. But, apart from a few dozen cardboardcutouts, thestands will be empty.
TheRaiders have hadtrouble adjusting to the lack of buzz. They only lost twice at home in each of the previous three seasons but have alreadymatched that total.