Wallace’s big line helps Tiger hoops top Scarlet Knights
By: Bob Nuse
When Joe Scott looks at the boxscore after a game, he never looks at the scoring column first. That’s especially true when it comes to his starting center, Judson Wallace.
"He got a couple of offensive rebounds in the beginning and I think that helped us get going," Scott said after his Princeton University men’s basketball team had defeated Rutgers, 53-40, in its home debut Wednesday night at Jadwin Gym. "I think that might have ignited a few other guys. He had one turnover and 11 rebounds. That’s going to win you games, regardless of what he does on offense. That’s how you beat good teams."
Wallace finished Wednesday night with the kind of line in the boxscore his head coach loves. The senior center had 18 points, 11 rebounds and three assists, while turning the ball over just once on the way to helping the Tigers improve to 4-2 on the season.
"We just try to go down on offense and get a bucket," said Wallace, who finished with season-highs in both points and rebounds. "Then we go back on defense and get low. Our scout team did a great job running their stuff and we were ready for a lot of what they were doing.
"I thought we did real well on the defensive end. When you play hard defense for 30 seconds and then you give up a (three-point shot) and it goes in, that’s always a dagger. When we’re on offense we just try to make shots and not turn it over. It just worked out the shots were coming for me."
For Princeton, it was a third straight win and the second time the Tigers have held an opponent to 40 points or less. Rutgers shot just 33 percent from the field and was just 4-for-20 in the second half. Meanwhile, the Tigers connected on 11 of their 35 three-point shots and outscored the Scarlet Knights, 26-7 over the final 13:34 to pull away for the win.
"We played well in the second half," said Scott, whose team is back in action Sunday at 4 p.m. at Monmouth. "In the first half we were a little tentative. But at halftime we talked about confidence and being aggressive on offense and on defense. The last thing I said to them before we went back out was that they’re shooting 50 percent and that’s too much.
"You have to make guys in college miss. In college, everybody can make shots when they’re open. They’re not going to miss on their own. I thought we did a better job in the second half of making them miss."
At the same time, Princeton did a better job on its own shots, solving the Rutgers zone and hitting six three-point shots down the stretch.
"Our challenge is to keep getting better on defense and figure out a way to be better against the zone on offense," Scott said. "We’ve playing in consecutive games against nothing but zone and we have two more games, Monmouth and Temple, where we’re going to see nothing but zone. That’s 80 more minutes of zone."
Which means more minutes of Wallace and fellow 6-foot-10 senior Mike Stephens playing together. The Tigers played the pair together most of the second half and they proved effective, as Stephens added two points and three rebounds to Wallace’s totals.
"It was very effective, especially the way we were outrebounding Rutgers with both of us in there," Wallace said. "There are not a lot of teams, especially in the Ivy League, that have two 6-10 guys that can be in there together and play. When Mike is in there and I’m at forward, it’s worked pretty well. We love playing together."
Scott also liked what he saw of the two playing together, especially with Rutgers in its zone defense.
"We did it against Holy Cross a little and I told my assistants we’ll do it more against a zone," Scott said. "With Judson on the perimeter and Mike inside, it gives us a different look. I thought it definitely paid dividends for us tonight. And (Matt) Sargeant gives us a different look as well. I like the way he played. Our freshmen have helped us."
Overall, it was a night in which Scott continued to see progress from his team. It’s a team that played without two projected starters, Luke Owings and Andre Logan, who are out with injuries.
"I think credit goes to our guys for getting the long rebounds and the extra shot attempts," Scott said. "Our second shots might not be putbacks, but what we do can sometimes be more devastating because we get the ball again. And now you have to play defense against us again.
"Defense is our staple and it has shown up and helped us win some games. We’re 4-2 having played one home game, which is a pretty good start."
And Wednesday night’s win made for a pretty nice looking final box, especially in the points scored column.

