When the Plymouth State Panthers paid a visit to the men's basketball team two years ago, brothers Ryan and Jason O'Keefe took the college court against each other for the first time. Ryan (LA '08) had an off-night for the Jumbos, scoring four points, while then-freshman Jason for the most part watched from the PSU bench.
Two years later, the rematch was a little different.
"I talked to their mom before the game," Tufts coach Bob Sheldon said. "I told her, this will be a perfect game. We'll give your son 30 and we'll win by 10."
Close enough.
Ryan was watching from the stands as Jason, now a junior shooting guard and the Panthers' second-leading scorer, recorded a career-high 28 points on 10-of-18 shooting on his brother's old stomping ground. Not to be outdone, junior co-captain Jon Pierce thundered back for the Jumbos, shooting 11-for-16, hitting six threes and finishing with a double-double -- 37 points and 10 boards. The game stayed close until the final minute, when Tufts pulled away to seal the 71-65 win.
With 11 minutes to play, Pierce hit three free throws to put the Jumbos in a comfortable 52-42 lead, but the Panthers clawed back. A quick 9-2 run narrowed the lead, and with 1:41 to play, PSU crept to within a point at 63-62. A Pierce three put the Jumbos up four, and two successive steals -- one from senior co-captain Aaron Gallant and the second from sophomore point guard Matt Galvin -- kept the Panthers at bay. In a game characterized by defense from wire to wire, the Jumbos ended it the right way.
"We played 30 really good minutes of defense," Pierce said. "We had maybe 10 minutes of lapses when we got up by 10 points in the second half, and we made a couple mental mistakes and let them get a couple open looks. But when it came down to it, it was 63-62, and we came down and got three stops in a row, right when we needed to. Really, that's what we're all about."
"We've been really trying to work on the defense," Sheldon said. "They've been working hard and getting up, and I think we're playing better defense. It was nice that defense finally wins the game for them, and we know we can build on that."
The defensive effort began in the paint, as junior Tom Selby had five blocks and Pierce contributed three. The Jumbos' post presence forced the Panthers outside, where they shot 5-of-14 from beyond the arc.
"With Tom and I inside, we have a pretty physical presence," Pierce said. "We want to make teams take contested jump shots, and we've worked really hard to keep teams out of the middle and deny their post catches, and tonight we did a really good job of that."
"It's a combination of those guys getting up and our wings getting up," Sheldon said. "We're denying wings now, whereas we didn't last year -- we were just kind of moving around the outside trying to protect the inside. Now we're pushing them out and we're using the wing defense to keep their passes from getting inside. It's a team effort."
On the wings, Gallant and junior Dave Beyel clamped down on O'Keefe and sophomore Matt Feehan, limiting their opening looks in the second half and holding PSU to 29 points, including just six in the first nine minutes of the half.
"When we were in the locker room, we talked about this," Selby said. "Both Dave and [Gallant], we told them, you've got to get into these guys. They didn't let O'Keefe into the middle in the second half, and that really helped, just keeping them outside. Either make them go baseline into us, or just keep them contained. That really helped a lot."
While the Jumbos did everything they could to contain O'Keefe after the break, Pierce took over on offense. He finished the game 6-for-8 behind the three-point line, 5-for-8 inside it and 9-for-11 from the free-throw line. The 37 points were the second-highest total of his career.
"When he's on, he's on, you know?" Selby said. "There's nothing you can do. We love to get him the ball. And the big thing is, we're moving the ball through me, but I'm just there looking to find the open guy ... I love the chemistry this year. We're moving the ball really well, and it just happens that he's the guy putting the baskets in. And that's great. I'm not complaining."
While Pierce's numbers to date have been eye-popping -- his 22.4 points per game lead the NESCAC and 8.6 rebounds rank him a close second -- he and his teammates still insist that it's all about teamwork, which is producing tangible results on both ends of the floor.
"I love the chemistry," Selby said. "We're working really hard. I know Pierce is putting up the numbers, but he's not going out there with the mentality that he wants the numbers. We're all sharing the ball, and we're all bringing it on defense. We made a goal for ourselves this year that defense was going to be the key, and we're doing it. We're getting everybody involved, and we're bringing it. I love the intensity."
