TORONTO – Aaron Best was at his peak on Friday night as he dropped 30 points and grabbed eight rebounds in a 105-82 victory over the Laurier Golden Hawks at Coca-Cola Court on Friday night.
BOXSCORE
Best started the game on fire with a personal 8-0 run to give the Rams an early jump from tipoff and also put the team on his back as the energy dropped coming out of halftime.
“I just wanted to stay aggressive and I think it worked to our advantage. It's a game of runs right, they're going to run at us and we had to make runs at them. You've got to absorb it and fight back and I think we did a good job of that tonight,” said Best on his and the team's efforts on countering Golden Hawk spurts of scoring.
“The guys didn't come out with the fire and intensity we saw on Wednesday against Brock, and we said at halftime just because they don't have a number beside their name means we can just take it easy and blow them out. You've got to take every game seriously and be the same way every night to be a national championship team,” said head coach Patrick Tatham on the lack of effort in the first half from the Rams.
The Rams turned the tides coming out of half, outscoring Laurier 35-26 in the third frame, finally breaking out in a game that had been back and forth for the majority of the first two quarters.
“Once we figured out that we should just take one of our bigs out and go small, it started working for us,” said Tatham on the adjustments he made in the third.
The bench returned to its high scoring form after a quiet night on Wednesday as Manny Diressa had 21 points in just 18 minutes on 8/10 from the floor. Filip Vujadinovic also posted a strong stat line of 13 points, seven rebounds and two steals.
“Sometimes Manny has a habit to want to pass a lot, but he's a natural scorer and a natural shooter so the days when he wants to pass he kind of struggles a little bit and today he was aggressive to score and it showed in the box score,” said Tatham on Diressa's efforts off the bench.
The Rams lead comfortably into the 4th and the reserves got an extended stretch of seven-minute run as the team wound down the 23 point victory.
Next Saturday will be the final home game of the regular season, as the Rams will play host to the Algoma Thunderbirds. It will also be senior night, as the team will recognize seniors Best, Kadeem Green, and Andy Agyepong.
“Yeah it'll be fun, it's been special for five years so I'm definitely going to enjoy it,” said Best on the special night upcoming for him.
