By Jeff Trousdale
Records were made and losing streaks were broken last week as the Pilot men defeated the University of San Francisco 78-60 on Thursday night and Santa Clara University 53-52 Saturday night.
The Pilots' conference home opener against the Dons was highlighted by a record night from sophomore guard Jared Stohl, who was 9-13 on 3-pointers while scoring a career high 33 points.
The Pilots got off to a rocky start when two of their big men, junior Robin Smeulders and sophomore Kramer Knutson got into early foul trouble while guarding USF big man Dior Lowhorn, the conference's leading scorer last season.
The guards made up for the big guys' struggles by going 9-16 from distance in the first half as UP jumped to a 45-26 first half lead. According to Stohl, it was the Pilots' transition game that allowed the shooters to get open so easily and hit 3-pointers.
"The guards did a good job of penetrating and kicking out to me in transition," Stohl said. "It was just in the flow of the game."
UP maintained its lead in the second half as it hit another five three-pointers, tying the team record of 14 3-pointers in a game.
Head coach Eric Reveno said his team shouldn't always rely on 3-pointers, but he didn't want his players to pass up open looks either.
"You've gotta have that freedom to shoot," Reveno said. "When you shoot open shots you can't complain."
One of those open looks came on a breakaway play in the second half when junior point guard T.J. Campbell bypassed a wide open Smeulders for a dunk, and instead gave the ball to Stohl, who drilled the open 3-pointer.
Junior guard Nik Raivio added 17 points to go with seven rebounds and four assists, while the Dons were paced by Lowhorn's 22 points.
If Thursday night's game was the Pilots' WCC coming out party, Saturday's game was the hangover.
The Pilots held Santa Clara to 34.7 percent shooting but were held to 36 percent shooting themselves in an ugly, slow paced game that was dominated by scrappy defense and poor marksmanship.
Much of the Pilots' shooting woes could be credited to Santa Clara senior center John Bryant, a 6-foot-11-inch, 275-pound monster inside who blocked two shots and affected many more. Raivio, who led the Pilots with 16 points and nine rebounds, said that Bryant was a game changer down low.
"There were a few times I was driving to the paint looking to get a shot but he was either making it a tough shot or getting a block," Raivio said.
Along with affecting shots, Bryant had 15 points and 22 rebounds, six of them offensive, tying the all-time Chiles Center record.
"I felt like he scored on all of them," Reveno said, referring to Bryant's put backs on offensive boards.
Smeulders and Knutson struggled with Bryant and Santa Clara forward Marc Trasolini inside, as the Pilot big men went a combined 0-11 from the field and had only seven rebounds between the two of them. Reserve forward Luke Sikma had 10 points on four of eight shooting, but many of his shots were off balance and in the face of pressure.
"Santa Clara is a really good defensive team so it didn't surprise me that we had trouble scoring the ball," Reveno said.
The Pilots were leading the game 43-26 with 12:24 remaining in the second half when the Broncos went on a 19-4 run, whittling UP's lead down to only 2 points with 3 minutes remaining.
But the Pilots were led back by Campbell, who made five of six free throws in the final 30 seconds and played solid defense on the Broncos' last second desperation 3-pointer in order to close out the game.
"I was just able to concentrate and knock down free throws in the end," Campbell said.
Campbell finished with 15 points, seven assists and only one turnover.
Reveno credited his team's experience with helping them hold on to get the victory, something that happened far less often last season.
"I think they had poise, which is big in these early games," Reveno said.
Raivio hopes to take the momentum from last week's games into this week's games at Loyola Marymount and Pepperdine.
"We're hungry, last season we lost some close ones but we're off to a good start and we just have to keep it going."
