All year long, the men's basketball team has been able to rely upon the inside presence of its offensive stars.
With senior tri-captains Dan Martin and Brian Fitzgerald and sophomore sensation Jake Weitzen, the Jumbos' roster is stacked with big guys who can take the ball to the hoop.
In their Feb. 25 NESCAC semifinal win over Trinity, the Jumbos outscored the Bantams 44-26 in the paint. Even in a losing effort at Amherst the following afternoon, the Jumbos got the best of the Lord Jeffs inside, outscoring them 42-38. And in Friday's drubbing of the Endicott Gulls, it was no contest, as the Tufts inside scorers prevailed, 48-28.
Saturday's matchup at SUNY Cortland, however, was a different story for the Tufts offense. The Jumbos ran into a pair of Red Dragon big men - senior center Scott Taggart and senior co-captain forward Simon Skrelja - who shut the Jumbos down inside and forced the Tufts offense to change its game plan.
Both players turned in double-doubles for the Dragons. Taggart had a game-high 11 rebounds along with his 10 points, while Skrelja had a team-high 18 points and 10 rebounds of his own.
"Taggart was a brick wall," said Weitzen, who finished with 14 points in the game. "It was really tough for Dan [Martin] to match up with him."
"Skrelja, he was just a good player all around," Fitzgerald added. "He's real quick, but he's strong. He gave us some trouble in our man-to-man."
The Dragon defense was hyper-aggressive throughout the game, as the Jumbos dished out just 13 assists and committed 14 turnovers. Cortland also nabbed 26 defensive rebounds, limiting the Jumbos to just eight offensive boards and just 10 second-chance points. In the end, the key strength of the Tufts offense was neutralized, as the Red Dragons outscored the Jumbos in the paint, 30-20.
So how did Tufts overcome the threat of that tenacious Cortland defense to come up with the win?
Surprisingly, they didn't rely on the brute force of their big men. In fact, Martin scored just eight points - as low a total as he's posted all season - and Fitzgerald added just three.
The team's duo of starting guards, sophomore Ryan O'Keefe and junior tri-captain David Shepherd, came to its rescue. After scoring just seven points at Amherst last Sunday, Shepherd dropped 12 points against the Gulls on Friday, followed by 14 against Cortland, including four straight clutch free throws in the final 24 seconds to send the Jumbos to the Sweet 16.
"I'm not going to say that I don't like the attention," Shepherd said of his starring role in the end of games. "It's a lot of fun being in that position."
"Shepherd's been amazing for us all year," Fitzgerald said. "He's won five or six of these close games at the end. You just don't want to see anyone else with the ball - you see him with it, and you just know it's going in."
Shepherd has indeed been the Jumbos' savior time and time again. His last-second heroics include two free throws to beat Springfield on Nov. 22, a clutch layup to take Brandeis into overtime on Dec. 3, and an overtime-forcing bucket in the Feb. 25 Trinity game. It's been a recurring theme throughout the Tufts season.
"I've gotten to know Dave really well this year and it's just part of his personality," Weitzen said. "He just loves to be that guy. It comes with experience, and there are countless times he's done that for us now."
O'Keefe, who scored just four points on 2-for-7 shooting against the Lord Jeffs, emerged to turn in perhaps the best weekend of his career. After scoring 18 points against Endicott, O'Keefe was dazzling against the Red Dragons on Saturday. He played 37 of the game's 40 minutes and led all scorers in the game with 21 points, including four threes. O'Keefe also nabbed five rebounds.
"Everyone knows Ryan's one of the best scorers in the NESCAC, hands down," Weitzen said.
And in a game in which Martin, Fitzgerald and junior forward Brian Kumf combined for just 19 points, O'Keefe couldn't have chosen a better time to step up.
"He might be the best pure shooter on the team," Fitzgerald said. "And he really kept us in that game."
