Silverio’s career day pushes Hofstra past Detroit

 

Omar Silverio’s 28 points and school record-tying eight 3-pointers were enough for Hofstra to win second straight game Saturday. (Photo by Bob Dea/Daly Dose Of Hoops)

By Jason Dimaio (@JasonDimaio1)

HEMPSTEAD, N.Y. — There was an offensive explosion in The Mack Sports Complex Saturday afternoon, and the charge was led by a senior coming off the bench for what would be the best performance of his career. 

It was the Omar Silverio show and nothing short of it, as he erupted for a career-high 28 points and eight 3-point field goals, the latter tying a school record, as Hofstra scored a 98-84 victory over Detroit-Mercy for the Pride’s second straight victory and head coach Speedy Claxton’s first over a Division I opponent on his home floor.

By the third media timeout of the opening half, Silverio had already scored 16 points, doubling his regular season average entering the game. When it was all said and done, the senior credited the slow start to his season as a key to his breakout performance.

“The first game (against Houston), I shot 3-for-15, so I said to myself that I have to put more shots up and I have to be efficient,” Silverio said. “I’ve been focusing on my shot and trusting myself.”

Getting contributions like today from players outside of Jalen Ray, Aaron Estrada and Zach Cooks make Hofstra that much more of a threat, and the Pride needs to sustain that scoring depth to give it that extra edge over everybody else. While it was easy going heading into halftime, as Hofstra (3-4) found itself sitting comfortably with a 24 point lead, the trend of momentarily taking its foot off the gas showed its face yet again. 

At the 11:29 mark of the second stanza, Hofstra found its lead cut to single digits as Detroit blitzed Hofstra on a 30-15 run, pulling the visiting Titans within nine points of the Pride. Hofstra had no answer for Horizon League Preseason Player of the Year Antoine Davis, who dropped a game-high 39 points and led the near-comeback. But unlike prior games, Hofstra found a way through the storm. 

After a timeout called by Claxton, it was all Pride from that point forward, as Hofstra went on a 22-11 run over the next seven minutes to fire the final dagger to Detroit, extending its lead back up to 20.

In a game with so many points being scored, the defensive aspect will get overlooked, but Hofstra was able to score 32 points on 20 turnovers to the delight of a visibly pleased head coach.

“That’s our backbone, our defense,” Claxton said. “We barely played our offense during practice. I’m not worried about us offensively, and these kids bought in. We have to be a good defensive team if we want to win a championship. We’re getting close.”

“We have to be mature and be able to play with a big lead. That’s the second time we had a big lead at halftime and we let the team come back, so once we clean that up I think we’ll be in a good place.”