Towson Men's Basketball Enters CAA Conference Tournament As One Of Nation's Hottest Teams
(WJZ)- The common cliche you'll hear from coaches whenever you ask about their team's performance late in a season is: We just want to be peaking at the right time. For Towson men's basketball head coach, Pat Skerry, his team is doing just that.
Since dropping their opening three games in conference play from December 28th-January 2nd, the Tigers have won 13 of their final 16 games. That includes a pair of wins to end the season over conference leader Hofstra and a tough Northeastern team that they'll see again this weekend. Skerry has been most impressed by his team's willingness to keep working, even when the early-season results weren't falling in their favor.
"It's been a fun group to coach. They have played really good basketball since January 3rd. I can't say enough good things about the type of guys we have had in terms of work ethic and camaraderie and being good teammates," said Skerry on the CAA coaches teleconference this week. "We know we got a, it's going to be a hard game Sunday, we're hoping for a little bit of good karma."
That hard game is the immediate rematch with the Huskies, the sixth seed, and according to Ken Pomeroy, the team with the second-best chances of cutting down the nets in Washington D.C.
The Tigers' recent performance is even more impressive given that junior forward Juwan Gray has missed the last seven games with a broken hand. Gray is the team's fifth-leading scorer and third-leading rebounder and has played a significant role off the bench this year. While the team would love to have him back in the rotation, his status is up in the air heading into the weekend.
"We'll do another X-ray a day or two before the tournament," said Skerry on the call. "We were told it would be 4-6 weeks, it'll be 4 weeks this week so we're hopeful but we don't know."
Gray's return would be huge for a Tigers team hoping to win its first CAA title and make its first NCAA Tournament appearance since the 1990-91 season. With or without Gray, the duo of senior Brian Fobbs and sophomore Allen Betrand will give Towson a shot. The pair have combined to average 30.2 points, 7.6 rebounds and three assists per game this season.
The hope, of course, is to be playing on Tuesday night, March 10th, with the chance to cut down the nets. But, even if that doesn't happen, Coach Skerry says he is proud of how this year's team responded after a tough 2018-19 season.
"We played a really hard non-conference schedule, and we didn't play great the first three days (of conference play) but you're playing Northeastern, Hofstra and Charleston. That's not exactly chopped liver," said Skerry. "I feel like this group has been eager to get better and come to work every day since the summer. We had a year we weren't used to having last year and, credit to these kids, I'm proud of the way they have helped our program respond."
Towson meets Northeastern in the quarterfinals of the CAA tournament on Sunday, March 8th at 8:30 p.m. EST. If the Tigers make the semifinals, their game on Monday would air on CBS Sports Network.
