PirateCrew: Seton Hall Pirates Football & Basketball Recruiting
The definitive source for all PirateCrew news.
By Colin Rajala
It’s been a Jekyll and Hyde beginning to conference play for Seton Hall and the Dr. Jekyll side was on full display Saturday evening for the Pirates as they easily downed the Butler Bulldogs 76-51.
With its second Big East win (2-4) the Pirates moved up to seventh from ninth in the conference standings, just one-half game behind Villanova, while Butler fell to eighth place at 2-4 in a day where ten
conference opponents matched up.
The Hall established an early inside presence with senior forward Tyrese Samuel, who led the team with 19 points, including the first seven and nine of the first eleven in the contest, on 9-11 shooting to go
along with seven rebounds.
Junior guard Kadary Richmond was back to running the offense and stuffing the stat sheet, finishing with 11 points, nine assists and eight rebounds. Senior forward Tray Jackson put up 15 points off the bench
and senior guard Al-Amir Dawes chipped in with 12 points to round out the Pirates in double figures.
The Dr. Jekyll performance was so evident that Head Coach Shaheen Holloway let his starters -- Richmond, Dawes, Samuel, Femi Odukale and KC Ndefo – play the first 13 minutes of the matchup without a substitution, a deviation from his typical pattern, and he only made the decision to sub after taking a minute to himself to reflect at the scorer’s table and review the box score while the rest of the team huddled during a TV timeout.“
“I just thought they came out with a lot of energy. My thing was, if it was working, why change it? No one looked tired, no one looked fatigued, no one was out of it, we had a good groove going. I just went
with the flow,” Holloway said after the game.
Seton Hall opened the game with Samuel connecting on a layup after posting-up Bulldog senior center Manny Bates. The Pirates proceeded to reel off seven out of the next nine points to take a 9-2 lead in
the first four minutes of the game on a Ndefo dunk in transition off the outlet pass from Richmond.
Richmond connected with Samuel on a lob from the three-point line to give The Hall a 11-4 lead at the first timeout. Butler would respond and close the game to 13-9 on a jumper from senior forward Jalen
Thomas with 13 minutes remaining in the first half, it would be the closest the Bulldogs were the rest of the matchup.
The Pirates regained control of the game, 25-11, with a 12-2 run over the next three minutes that included threes from Dawes and Richmond. Over the course of the run, Richmond found a wide-open Samuel for an easy dunk in transition prompting a timeout from first year head coach Thad Matta. The Hall forced Butler into a shot clock violation on the ensuing possession and Richmond proceeded to feed Samuel for another easy bucket, frustrating Matta into another timeout just 16 seconds later.
Butler tried its best to get back in the game, drawing to within 29-20 on a Thomas layup with seven minutes left, but Seton Hall closed the half on a 12-3 run with Jackson contributing eight points on two
threes and a drive and score.
For the evening, Seton Hall held Butler to 15-56 shooting from the field (26.8%) and 4-21 from three (19%), while forcing 14 turnovers.
In contrast, The Hall had 17 assists to just 12 turnovers, shooting 29-55 from the field (52.7%) and 7-16 (43.8%) from long distance, displaying some of the better ball movement and shooting on the season
thus far.
“That’s what we’ve been harping on. I’ve been harping on that all week that we have to (move the ball). The fact that we got 17 assists — I’m not sure how many turnovers we had — that’s gotta be who we
are, because we have a lot of good playmakers and a lot of good ball handlers. There’s no reason for us not to have that.”
