Jay Frank started the season picking up where he left off as a First Team All- New Jersey Athletic Conference selection for The College of New Jersey’s men’s basketball team, despite missing part of the preseason with a broken shooting hand.
Breaking out with a flurry of 20-point games from the outset, the former Brick Memorial High School star won the conference’s first two Player of the Week awards. The college’s athletic office could not remember the last time a member of the men’s team earned that distinction back-to-back.
“It hasn’t happened since I’ve been here,” said Frank, a senior, and the team’s co-captain for the second straight year. “I started to play good in those six games. The first four games I was OK, and then in games five and six I played my two best games.”
The third-year starting guard scored 57 points in those two games, and grabbed 15 rebounds and had seven steals. The outburst put him in the conference lead in scoring at 21.5 points per game and in steals at 2.83 per game.
“I was making the shots I should make and going to the foul line a lot because I was going to the basket,” Frank said. “I’d just like to pick it up on the defensive end, and I need to make more shots because my [shooting] percentages are down.”
Frank sank half of his 20 shots from the floor in a 93-85 road victory over Muhlenberg College and scored 28 in the Lions’ 97- 88 loss to Centenary College. It was a situation similar to the last two years when Frank got off to a late start — last year because of a back injury, and two years ago because of mononucleosis.
Frank scored 18 points earlier in the season when The College of New Jersey suffered its first loss of the season, 85-74 to the host team in the Wyndham Reading Albright College Tipoff Tournament to slip to 3-1. The Lions’ up-tempo style leads to a lot of quick shots and fast-break scoring opportunities but also gives the opposing team the ball back quickly.
“We’re not playing good defense,” Frank said. “I’m totally not satisfied with our [4-4] start. We played our worst games in our losses. Getting the [Player of the Week] honor back-to-back is nice, but I’d trade it for an undefeated start.”
Frank and the rest of the Lions lost their stride in the first two NJAC games, losing to Rowan University, 86-64, on Dec. 2 and William Paterson University, 78-46, on Dec. 5. For Frank, the game was a stark contrast from the previous six games: he scored 11 points in both games combined and will have fallen well out of the conference scoring lead when the updated statistics are released later this week. Frank scored five points on 2-for-8 shooting in just 16 minutes of action against Rowan. He followed with six points on 2-for-9 shooting over 24 minutes against William Paterson. The reserves got a lot of playing time while coach Kelly Williams was looking for the right player combinations.
“It was a little rough,” Frank said after the Rowan loss. “The coach sat me down a little bit because I just wasn’t playing well, and I’m not sure why. We all were not playing well. I haven’t had that kind of game since my freshman year in college.”
But it’s a long season ahead for Frank. A lot can happen as the Lions bid again to make the conference playoffs at the end of the season, as they did last year before losing in the first round and finishing 10-15. The conference champion gets an automatic bid to the NCAA Division III Tournament in March. The Lions, in a schedule quirk, do not play again until Dec. 17, when they travel to NCAA Division I Davidson College in North Carolina, and then they’re off for the holiday break.