DeAndre’ Bembry plays a smooth and controlled all-around style. He’s a throwback player. Old school.
In front of 30 or so former Hawks from six different decades, the Saint Joseph’s star led his team to a third straight win in an 80-55 blowout over the Fordham Rams on Saturday at Hagan Arena (see Instant Replay).
Bembry did it all for head coach Phil Martelli’s Hawks (14-3, 4-1) in the 25-point victory, St. Joe’s largest of the year. He scored 26 points, shooting 11 for 17 from the floor. He grabbed 12 rebounds, half of which came on the offensive end. It was his fifth double-double of the season.
“He’s a throwback’s throwback,” Martelli said. “I actually thought the way they played him and where we put him on the floor, I thought today he would get double-digit assists.”
The junior finished with three of the Hawks’ 17 assists. Instead, he was able to exploit the Rams’ defensive game plan. Fordham spread out its defense and pressed St. Joe’s guards off the ball. Martelli saw Fordham overextending and cut the Rams’ defense apart with back cuts.
Bembry took advantage.
“I played a little bit more off the ball,” Bembry said. “Shavar (Newkirk) brought the ball up, and I would make a back cut. I probably made five or six back cuts. That’s just how I was able to score tonight.”
“He had a flow to his game,” Martelli said. “They could have called him out for playing in the ‘60s, the ‘70s, the '80s. He just has an old school game.”
It was the plan going in, and St. Joe’s executed time and time again. The game plan allowed the Hawks to get to the basket for the easy buckets. The Hawks would finish with a 44-32 advantage in the paint.
“Fordham plays a new defense where they’re trapping all over the place and just denying you the ball," Martelli said. "When someone’s denying you, the play to make is a back cut or flash, and that’s how we ran away with it.”
Bembry was not the only St. Joe’s player to feed off a well-crafted game plan. The Hawks had five players score in double figures in all. Newkirk (12), James Demery (11), Aaron Brown (10) and Isaiah Miles (10) all joined Bembry in that department. Bembry and Miles have now recorded double-digit points in each of the Hawks’ 17 games this season.
The Hawks also thrived on the defensive end of the court, putting together one of their more complete games of the year. They held Fordham, a team that came in averaging over 75 points per game, to 55. The Rams were suffocated on offense, unable to find any consistency. They shot 41 percent from the floor and just 23 percent from deep, and turned the ball over 15 times.
Fordham’s two leaders were rendered ineffective. Mandell Thomas came in averaging a team-best 15.3 points per game and was held to eight points on 4-for-14 shooting. Ryan Rhoomes, who was averaging 14.2 points and 8.4 rebounds per contest, was limited to 10 points and six boards.
St. Joe’s led wire-to-wire, ballooning the lead to as many as 34 late in the second half. Martelli’s team bullied the Rams with a physical display of basketball that led to the Hawks finishing with a 41-27 advantage of the glass. Of those 41 rebounds, 14 came on the offensive boards.
The Hawks will now play back-to-back games against Big 5 opponents at Penn on Wednesday and La Salle on Saturday. But even after Saturday’s blowout win that kept St. Joe’s near the top of the Atlantic 10 standings, Martelli is still waiting for his team to hit its full stride.
“I will say this, I still think our best performance is still out there,” Martelli said. “I don’t think we’ve played to peak performance yet.”