TOWSON, Md. --- A few things worth mentioning from Towson's 55-41 loss to Drexel on Thursday ...
1. Towson isn't beating anyone if it doesn't get scoring from Four McGlynn and Timajh Parker-Rivera. This was already fairly obvious, and it was a wonder the Tigers (8-8, 1-2 CAA) outlasted Elon on Monday when McGlynn struggled.
But McGlynn remained ensconced in a slump, scoring only four points and shooting 1 of 9 from the floor against the Dragons (3-11, 1-2). Parker-Rivera played 27 quiet minutes, managing three rebounds and two missed shots for his trouble.
"You hope to get more than four points and three rebounds out of them in a big conference game," coach Pat Skerry said. "When that happens, it's a little bit like reaching into a Planters mixed bag of nuts. You never know what you're getting now."
That problem permeates the rest of his roster. The Tigers got useful days out of John Davis and Walter Foster, and Alex Gavrilovic was fine despite a couple turnovers. But Towson has so few consistent pieces that it's hard to anticipate what it will get on a nightly basis.
2. Drexel exploited mismatches on the perimeter repeatedly in the second half. The Dragons don't have a ton of options at this stage, so they were bound to go four-out, one-in at various stages. But it's what worked best, and Towson stuck with a lineup that usually featured two of Foster, Gavrilovic and Parker-Rivera (they combined for 76 minutes).
The Dragons consistently found the guard-vs.-big option toward the end of the shot clock in the second half, and then did so again a couple times when Towson switched to zone in the final six minutes. Either way, Drexel usually got a layup out of the bargain.
"What we did was we put Parker on statistically their lowest scorer," Skerry said. "We weren't going to put him on Lee or Allen. Those are two all-conference players. We'll do the exact same thing up there."
3. Ball-handling did in Towson yet again. The Tigers had eight giveaways after the break, and were on the wrong end of a 13-0 margin in points off turnovers. Of the 10 players who saw time, only one (Byron Hawkins) had more assists than turnovers.
It's not a problem easily fixed, and one unlikely to be rectified before the end of this season. But if there's a single thing holding the Tigers back from a push into the top half of the CAA, ball-handling probably slightly edges out shooting at this stage as the team's biggest headache.
--- Patrick Stevens
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