Davidson’s Skogman, other bigs shoot lights out in reset win over Western Carolina
David Skogman found himself wide open at the top of the key, like he had several times before on Wednesday night, and let go of a 3 like he knew it was going in.
He had reason to think it was.
The 6-foot-10 redshirt junior had hit two 3s in three possessions leading up to that shot, fueling a 6-2 Davidson run and a 44-36 second-half lead in a game when Davidson needed firepower. So Skogman set up, rose up, watched his shot swish through — and tossed up three fingers on his way back on defense as the home crowd roared, as if to gesticulate the two most devastating syllables in basketball: Ballgame.
The Wildcats (7-3) used that timely shooting from Skogman in John M. Belk Arena en route to a 72-64 win over Western Carolina (4-6) on Wednesday night. The victory delivers Davidson a reprieve after two heartbreaking losses — one against Charlotte that saw a buzzer-beating 3 in overtime lead to a loss, and another two-point loss on the road against Delaware.
“It was a much-needed win coming off two rough losses, so I’m happy we could bounce back,” junior guard Grant Huffman told The Observer postgame.
He was then asked about what it meant for his big men to shoot so well: “It means everything. When we can space the floor like that, everything else will open up, and we’ll start to get better and better looks.”
And the Wildcats did.
It wasn’t just Skogman, who finished with 17 points thanks to three 3s and eight free throws, who showed up. Virtually all of the Davidson frontcourt did. And they shot well from deep, too.
They shot well out of necessity: Davidson got off to a slow start. The team didn’t notch a field goal until the 16:24 mark in the first half, and the team’s first three possessions saw four misses from lone senior and 20-plus-point-per-game scorer Foster Loyer. (Loyer finished with six points, five assists and five rebounds.)
Part of what made Davidson’s first-half offensive performance so wonky was because of the visiting team’s defensive scheme. The Catamounts essentially had their center camp out in the lane and help out on any and every off-ball screen while the rest of the team chased Davidson’s guards around and ran them off the 3-point line.
What that resulted in? A ton of wide-open big men 3s.
“That’s how they defend,” said Davidson head coach Matt McKillop, whose voice was as hoarse as can be postgame. “They usually do it with their five-man; they did it with their four and their five tonight. We knew we would get looks for our bigs, but the emphasis was, ‘You don’t need to take the first one.’ Because the same look is going to be there later in the clock.”
The Wildcats went 3-for-9 in the first half from deep. Seven of those attempts were from forwards; four of them were from 6-foot-9, 245-pound big Sam Mennenga. (Mennenga finished with 16 points — nine of those points came from beyond the 3-point line — and the team finished 8-of-16 from deep on the night.)
More of those shots started falling in the second half, and the Wildcats were able to ride out the win the rest of the way.
Skogman’s shooting started it all.
“David made one, the next possession down he took an early one, and then the next possession after, we ran something for him to get an early one,” McKillop said. “David’s a great shooter. That’s maybe his best talent as an offensive player: shooting. And Sam’s a pretty good shooter as well.”
He added: “We anticipated we would get those looks. We wanted to make sure we were running offense, making them guard actions, and then take those looks if we needed to. And thankfully we made some.”
Four more observations from Davidson’s win
▪ It wasn’t all big men, of course. Guard Desmond Watson, who comes off the bench but plays starter minutes, had a breakout game — hitting momentum-sustaining 3s and flushing away fastbreak dunks in the second. He finished with a tied-for-team-best 17 points in a team-high 35 minutes of play.
▪ The Catamounts didn’t quit. The team used an active 1-2-2 press to cause Davidson turnovers and give WCU a chance late, but good free-throw shooting down the stretch from Davidson proved too much for the team to overcome. The Wildcats finished 16-of-23 from the line.
▪ The Davidson home crowd saw a lot of local talent on Western Carolina’s roster. The Catamounts started Tyler Harris, an Independence High School native — and their head coach, Justin Gray, was a West Charlotte High School standout before going on to play for Wake Forest and have a 12-year pro career. Gray came over from Winthrop in 2021-22. Other Catamounts with ties to the Charlotte area: Senior transfer Russ Jones Jr., a former Winthrop (Rock Hill) guard standout who entered Wednesday’s game averaging 9.8 points per game this season, and freshman Marcus Kell (Legion Collegiate Academy, Rock Hill).
▪ Loyer might be looking forward to Davidson’s matchup with No. 4 Purdue in a week more than anyone. The super senior point guard, who just last week was the nation’s fifth-leading scorer, will match up with his freshman brother, Fletcher, who is playing well for the Boilermakers in the contest. It’s the first time the two will play each other in formal competition, the older Loyer said, because of the five-year age difference. It’ll be a big game for Davidson in general, too: The Wildcats have already notched a few wins that might turn some proverbial heads in NCAA tournament selection room — including against San Francisco at home and South Carolina at a neutral site — and Purdue marks Davidson’s last chance to earn a statement nonconference win before Atlantic 10 play begins Dec. 28.
This story was originally published December 7, 2022 at 9:17 PM.
