The Tigers had to play a very good game of basketball on both sides of the court to defeat an 8-1 Indiana University-East team. What let them down most were the little things on defense needed to defeat a strong opponent.
DePauw (5-2) fought to a 31-28 lead at the half, but could not keep the Red Wolves (9-1) from storming back in the second half. The Red Wolves led by as much as 16 following a 20-4 run coming out of the half, defeating the Tigers 79-66.
"We had pretty good defensive energy in the first half," said senior forward Sean Haseley. "We made them take tough shots and we rebounded the ball well. Coming out in the second half, we were kind of flat and they took the lead and we were battling back from there."
The Tigers carried strong momentum after Haseley shot 4-5 from the field including hitting 2-2 from beyond the arc for 10 points. Coupled with another 10 points from sophomore point guard Michael Wilkison, DePauw also played some good defense to force nine turnovers from Indiana-East.
"We were defending pretty well," said head coach Bill Fenlon. "We had about four or five mental errors in the first half where they were able to get easy opportunities. Then we had about 15 to 20 of those in the second half."
DePauw hit two of its first seven shots while the Red Wolves, during their 20-4 run coming out of halftime, hit 10-13. A three-point halftime lead for the Tigers turned in to a 15-point deficit within seven minutes. Fenlon described his team's defense as making key mental errors in concentration on the court.
"We're either not helping at all or over-helping like nobody's business and that's really the problem with our defense right now," Fenlon said. "Our concentration is not good, our overall understanding of where we want to try and direct the ball and where the help is coming, it's a work in progress that needs to happen."
With five minutes left in the game, Haseley hit back-to-back three's to pull the Tigers to within 10. Junior forward Barry Flynn then hit a lay-up and was fouled in the act of shooting, good for a three-point play. He then came up with a steal on the next possession and finished with a dunk, shrinking the Red Wolves' lead to five. But the Tigers would not score again as Indiana East rattled off eight points and shut down the DePauw offense again for a final score of 79-66.
"Ultimately, we never really adjusted to the way they were guarding us defensively," Fenlon said. "We never really got in any sort of comfort in executing our offense. We were able to string some stops together at the end and score some points."
While Fenlon described his team as one which struggled on both ends of the court, the main problem which allowed the Red Wolves to score 51 points in the second half was the defense.
"Some of it is about technique but a lot of it is about decision making," Fenlon said. "The problem with us is we'd be starring at the guy who is driving with the ball and we're not really helping. But we're not in time to get to our guy who is a great three point shooter."
Thwe Tiger's next game will be Saturday at Ohio Wesleyan University, the second NCAC game for the team. What DePauw can still take away from this game is the fact that they still were able to come back from a very large deficit.
"We didn't tank it from there, we battled back," Haseley said. "Going in to the next game you have take the positives and get back to work and get ready to go for the NCAC game on Saturday."