Iona’s poise through adversity guides Gaels past Fordham

NEW ROCHELLE, N.Y. — It has long been viewed that a team’s demeanor is often the reflection of its coach. If the coach is energetic, it will be visible in his or her team’s comportment on the floor. A calm leader in times of adversity will usually yield a group of layers that will not panic in huge moments.

Through his first three games leading Iona, Dan Geriot has projected the latter. That is not to say he lacks emotion on the sideline — nothing could be further from the truth — but the trust he has in his players, and vice versa, has not been difficult to manifest.

On Friday, when Fordham gave the Gaels their first real dose of adversity on the young season by leading most of the night and tying the game late in the second half of Dejour Reaves’ return to the Hynes Athletics Center, Geriot was unfazed, and so was his team, displaying a unified front in a 64-58 deficit.

“Geriot, he’s coming from (the NBA), so he’s seen a lot,” point guard CJ Anthony explained. “He’s played 82 games a season, so his calmness and his demeanor is like no other. So when we see our head coach have that type of demeanor, it feeds off to us. If the person leading the ship isn’t worried, then what are we worried for?”

Anthony then proceeded to take matters into his own hands, scoring the last seven points of a 13-2 run that seized control down the stretch of what turned out to be a 76-71 Iona win, finishing with 21 points and stealing the stage from Reaves and the Rams.

“I feel like we’ve got a lot of chemistry, a lot of trust in each other,” Anthony said of the cohesiveness among his team. “So when stuff like that happens, it was time for us to show how together we are as a team. It’s the third game of the season, we’ve got a lot more to go, a lot more to do. It’s good to see right now, but we’re nowhere near the team we want to be in March.”

“I think we try to stay pretty calm,” Geriot added. “We internalize a lot, but I think our program approaches — our preparation, our routine, our consistency — are extremely above average. I really believe that. And that’s why we can trust in what we’re doing and how we feel in those games. We’re really trying to build this camaraderie. We feel pretty confident in how it’s going. People continue to give in and be selfless, and that kind of reflects how we play.”

Playing Fordham for the first time since 2006, Iona (3-0) did not have the explosive start it enjoyed last week against Hofstra, but fed off a capacity crowd and relied on that boost — as well as its own bond — to weather the storm. Anthony contributed eight assists to the cause and continued his aggressive style by drawing eight fouls, while Lamin Sabally added 11 points, eight rebounds and six assists to showcase his versatility once more, a trait the senior credits to Geriot placing a level of trust in him that he had never experienced prior to arriving at Iona.

“I feel like he’s the first coach in my college career that’s seen my potential to make plays for my teammates,” Sabally said of Geriot. “I used to be a playmaker when I was young, I just stopped growing. (Geriot) definitely saw my potential and put his trust in me. Now I can trust him.”

Fordham (2-2) was unable to mount a rally after the game-changing Iona run, something head coach Mike Magpayo lamented as his former roommate Geriot — whose wedding Magpayo officiated — got the better of him in the first encounter between the two.

“I thought we got outcoached, to be honest, in the last six minutes there,” Magpayo reflected. “The ball got stuck a little bit, we weren’t throwing the ball inside, which was our advantage, and they did a great job just picking on a couple matchups. They ran the same play over and over again, and we couldn’t guard it. It’s on me. I got outcoached by my boy Dan.”

Iona now furthers a start that few envisioned out of the gate, with only Princeton standing between the Gaels and an undefeated record heading into the Paradise Jam in the Virgin Islands. And through the first two weeks of the season, the most defining characteristic of this group is its commitment to a process forged by development and conviction, and a unique sense of self. 

“Every time we get a chance to be us, we just try to be us,” Anthony said. “Regardless of what they’ve got going on, we believe our stuff works and we put enough work in, so whatever situation it is, we just trust each other to make the right play, the right decision.”

“We have really big aspirations here,” Geriot said of the 3-0 beginning to the season. “We were very transparent in our recruiting process. We understand what this place is, we understand what we’re after and our locker room feels that. To start off this way is publicly above expected, but I think we have a pretty professional, mature group that really wants to win a lot of games.”