Ebby Asamoah drained a 3-point shot with 8:16 left on the Carpenter Center clock Saturday night and Blue Hen partisans in the crowd of 1,916 roared with delight.
It was the fourth straight Delaware bucket and trimmed what had been a 16-point Hofstra deficit to seven. Hope had suddenly replaced anguish among those assembled.
But then Hofstra put together a second surge, and Delaware’s chances were vanquished in the Colonial Athletic Association basketball showdown as quickly as they had re-emerged.
BOX SCORE: Hofstra 60, Delaware 66
The visitors had scored on nine of 10 possessions to start the second half, an impressive onslaught fueled by five 3-pointers.
They then answered Asamoah’s basket with a 7-point run that sent them on the way to an 80-66 victory, as Hofstra handed Delaware its third loss in its last four home games.
“They put a lot of pressure on you defensively, in transition, and then just with their ability to make tough shots one-on-one,” Delaware coach Martin Ingelsby said. “I don’t know if I wanna go back and watch the tape but I thought we played some pretty good defense at times and it was just better offense than our defense.”
Delaware (16-9 overall, 7-5 CAA) remained in fourth place in the CAA.
The Blue Hens play their third home game in five days Monday at 7 p.m. when James Madison makes its final CAA visit before the Dukes’ summer move to the Sun Belt Conference. JMU (14-10, 4-8) handled William & Mary 69-55 on Saturday.
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Third-place Hofstra (17-9, 9-4 CAA), which beat 24th-ranked Arkansas in December, has now won 17 of the last 20 games against Delaware, including eight of nine in Newark plus a previous matchup this season 82-77 on Long Island.
“I feel for our group because we wanted this so bad,” Ingelsby added. “We were ready to compete. It was tough night. We didn’t get it done but we battled to give ourselves a chance.”
Hofstra is in its first season under coach Speedy Claxton, who starred at point guard for the Pride from 1996-2000. He sparked Hofstra to a 76-69 win over two-time defending champ Delaware in the 2000 America East title game at Hofstra, before going off to the NBA.
Claxton was 0-6 against the Hens in the Carpenter Center during his playing career, including a couple America East Tournament defeats. The long-time Hofstra assistant is now 1-0 as a head coach thanks to a versatile array of shooters.
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Hofstra, which led 39-35 at halftime, started the second half 9-for-10 from the field and had its largest lead 65-49 with 10:47 to go after Jalen Ray’s 3-pointer. Hofstra later went 5-for-7 to transform a 67-60 lead into 74-60 after Delaware rallied.
“If we’re gonna give ourselves a chance,” Ingelsby said, “we gotta dig in on that end and get more stops than we did.”
Sanford School graduate Jyare Davis led Delaware with 16 points, Ryan Allen scored 12 and Anderson and Asamoah added 10 each for the Hens.
Delaware, which came in with a league-best 49.4 field-goal percentage in CAA games, had several cold spells, shot 39.6 percent (21-for-53) and was 8-for-21 on 3-pointers.
Dylan Painter had two points and zero rebounds in 9-plus minutes for Delaware in his return after missing three games with an ankle injury.
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Aaron Estrada, the CAA’s leading scorer, had 21 points to lead five Hofstra players in double figures. The guard was MAAC Rookie of the Year at St. Peter’s in 2019-20 before transferring to Oregon, where he appeared in just nine games last year before transferring to Hofstra before this season.
In the second half, the Pride shot 53.1 percent from the field (17-for-32) and made 6 of 13 treys. Hofstra also dominated Delaware on the boards 43-28.
Kvonn Cramer, the 2021 CAA All-Rookie pick out of Mount Pleasant High, made just his second appearance in Hofstra’s last 10 games after being sidelined with a back injury. He had two points and three rebounds in 5½ minutes.
“I felt like we were playing good defense,” Anderson said. “They just made a lot of tough shots, like, over us. As a team, they really had it going that first eight minutes of the second half. There was a point in time where I was just like, ‘Dang, they’re just not missing at all.’ But that’s a really good team and they’re coached really well, so we’ll get ‘em next time.”
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