Robins gives Tigers a lift off the bench
By: Justin Feil
Ray Robins is a changed man, more a pass-swinger and board-clinger than the gunslinger of years past.
Maybe it was the year away from Princeton University, or perhaps it was losing his starting spot after the seventh game of the season, but most likely it’s that he sees that this is his last shot at an Ivy League title and his final chance at reaching the NCAA tournament.
"That has to be it," said the PU men’s basketball senior. "I never would have said it last year. Growing up, and all the way through until now, I’ve always been out there to score. Now I’m out there to make all my shots."
This from a guy who put up 12 shots and had 27 points in his first career start, the most since Bill Bradley’s starting debut in 1963.
Robins, who hasn’t been to an NCAA tournament as an active player since his freshman year, is leading the Tiger men’s basketball team in field goal percentage and three-point percentage and continues to be one of the team’s top three scorers while increasing his rebounding and assist totals despite averaging under 23 minutes per game in a reserve role.
Princeton will be looking for his offense, his defense and his rebounding as they play at Penn 8 p.m. tonight at The Palestra. Both squads are 4-0 in league play after another perfect weekend.
"They’re a veteran team," said PU head coach John Thompson of the Quakers. "There’s not anything that’s going to surprise us. You can talk about our defense, but our offensive execution at the end of the day is what will be the big thing."
Both he and Robins acknowledge, however, that it was the Penn rebounding that caused the biggest problems last year when it swept Princeton. The Quakers held a 39-27 rebounding edge in winning, 62-38, in the teams’ first meeting at Jadwin Gym last season and then owned a 36-24 edge in winning, 64-48, in the teams’ second meeting at Penn.
"When we played them in The Palestra last year, we were in the game," said Robins, who had eight points and two rebounds in that game. "Then they started getting second shots and we missed ours. It wasn’t that we weren’t getting shots, we just didn’t make them."
That loss cost the Tigers the outright Ivy League title before they fell to Yale in the first-ever three-way Ivy playoff. For Robins, it’s more than that game that is motivation against Penn. After taking off the 2000-01 season when the Tigers swept Penn, Robins has not been on the court when Princeton has defeated Penn since the first game of his freshman year in the miraculous 50-49 comeback at The Palestra.
"I still haven’t got one," the Paso Robles, Calif. resident said. "I have the bittersweet one when I was just practicing with the team. The only ones we’ve won (against Penn) are when I was just practicing."
Robins believes this year could see a change. Princeton comes off two convincing wins in New York. The Tigers shut down Columbia for a 68-51 win Friday and then topped Cornell, 67-49, Saturday as Robins had 14 points.
"We’re playing well," said Robins, who is averaging 9.6 points per game overall, 10.5 in the Ivy season for third-best on the Tigers. "We’re playing more together than we have in the past. A lot of games earlier in the year we lost because of making too many mistakes. We’re limiting our mistakes now. It’s going to be more now of figuring out what they’re trying to do and trying to stop it as a team."
Offensively, Penn hasn’t changed much since last season. They still rely on Ugonna Onyekwe inside and guard penetration to open up their outside shooters.
"They are a very good offensive team," Thompson said. "They are an outstanding shooting team. You just have to somehow limit the penetration and limit the open shots. It sounds easy. . ."
"Not to put too much pressure on anybody, but a lot of this will ride on Will (Venable) and Kyle (Wente). The main thing is (Penn point guard Andy) Toole starts it off. If he gets an edge, he kicks it out. They’re good at having an edge and kicking it out. The key is everybody keeping their body in front of their man and not requiring their help."
Sounds easy. On the other end, Penn will have to deal with a Princeton team that is shooting better than last year and scoring almost 10 points better than last season’s Tiger team. Robins has tried to do his part off the bench.
"I’ve been saying that Will and (Spencer Gloger) have been our scorers," he said. "I’ve turned myself into more of someone who just takes open shots. I feel like I want to do whatever comes to me rather than try to take advantage.
"I’m only taking good shots," he added of his high shooting percentage. "Some guys are more apt to take bad shots. And whereas they’re taking 10 to 12 shots a game, I’m taking about six shots a game and they’re good ones. It’s not just me though. Kyle has been limiting his shots as well."
It’s a senior leadership thing that the two hope will carry the Tigers to their ultimate goal. Sometimes you have to increase your shots for the team, sometimes you back off.
"We want the championship," Robins said. "We want to win."
And the first meeting of Penn and Princeton is a bit different this season in that it does not come in the seventh Ivy League game of the season for both. Instead, both are 4-0 after two Ivy weekends, still behind Brown, who improved to 6-0 by sweeping Harvard and Dartmouth this weekend. Princeton hasn’t faced Penn in a game that wasn’t the end of the first half of the Ivy season since 1995-96, when they opened the Ivy season with a loss to Penn.
"Usually you’re coming in having played everybody," Robins said. "Having Brown already at 6-0, this game seems bigger. One of us stays in first with Brown and the other one drops to second. And now you’re giving a game lead to more than one team and you’re dropping off. But the next three games are much more telling than this one at this point."
Princeton hosts Brown and Yale after Penn to finish the first half of the season. Robins and the Tigers are hoping that it’s a first half that ends with them on top.
And more than that, Ray Robins is hoping that Princeton finds itself all alone at the top of the standings when it really matters at the end of the season. Tonight’s matchup with pre-season favorite Penn will be a step in that direction.
"It’s what we’ve been waiting for," Robins said. "As a game itself, it does only count as one. But what stands out in our minds is last year when they came down here and beat us real bad. They just dominated us in every aspect. That more stands out as to why this is not your average game."