Guard Amante Britt continues his great play as SRU takes home the win over Alderson Broaddus.
Coming off of a 17-12 season where The Rock qualified for the PSAC tournament, Head Coach Ian Grady is looking to return to the tournament and go further. They took a good step toward that goal last night against Alderson Broaddus in game one of the Butler County Chamber of Commerce Conference Challenge.
SRU leads Alderson Broaddus in their all-time series 2-1 and they widened the gap with the win on their opening night.
The team got off to somewhat of a slow start as they entered halftime down 33-26.
“First game jitters, all that type of stuff,” Grady said.
Halftime adjustments must have been important for SRU. Coach Grady rallied the team and it resonated, because the team field goal percentage went from 33.33% in the first half to 50% in the second. The defense picked up their game as well. Alderson Broaddus shot just 32.26% from the field in the second half and Coach Grady added that The Rock forced 13 turnovers. Perhaps most impressively, after The Rock took the lead late, they held A-B scoreless for over four minutes to end the game on top, 68-62.
“The second half the intensity was way better,” Grady said.
The win was obviously the goal, and everyone was happy to reach their goal. That being said, good teams become great because they never stop working. Coach Grady fully intends to assume that mentality. He commented on what The Rock needs to do moving forward if they want to keep winning.
“I would like to see just two quick fixes. Take care of the ball more, turnovers were a problem. And then we didn’t rebound the way that we needed to rebound the ball,” Grady said. “Those are two easy things that we should be able to correct quickly.”
One of the biggest keys to Slippery Rock Men’s basketball success over the past few seasons has been strong play by now-graduate student guard Amante Britt, the team captain. Britt has missed just one game since his 2018 debut. That durability combined with obvious talent led to him accumulating 13.6 points per game, 4.7 assists per game, 2.9 rebounds per game, and 1.4 steals per game while shooting 41.9% from the floor and 80.6% from the foul line last season, which were all career highs.
He reminded everyone of this again last night. Britt was The Rock’s leading scorer with 19 points while shooting over 50% from the field. Coach Grady shared this sentiment.
“When the ball is in his hands, good things happen,” Grady said.
Mistakes will happen particularly early on in a season. Everyone knows this. Everyone also knows that it is equally important to work through any difficulty to add to the win column when the clock hits all zeroes. Coach Grady commended his players for their perseverance.
“Great job finding a way to win when we didn’t really play our best game… The win is what matters,” Grady said.
Slippery Rock follows up last night’s game with a matchup at 6 PM, this Saturday, November 12th, against Notre Dame College of Ohio.
