On Nov. 20, Georgetown men’s basketball (3–1, BIG EAST) bounced back in big fashion from their blowout loss to Notre Dame and played their most complete game to date against the Mount St. Mary’s Mountaineers (3–2, MAAC), 79-51, the lowest total allowed by a Cooley squad in his 36 games coaching on the Hilltop.
The team clearly received whatever message Cooley gave his team about their defense after the Notre Dame game, as the Georgetown defense dominated the night. After surrendering 84 points to the Fighting Irish a week ago, the Hoyas held Mount Saint Mary’s to just 51 points on 67 shot attempts on the night.
On offense though, the Hoyas clearly still have some work to do. After starting the game hot on the backs of graduate guard Micah Peavy and junior guard Jayden Epps, the Hoyas sprinted out to a 25-9 lead by the midway point of the first half. In addition, the Hoyas flipped the script from their last game, starting 9-16 from the field and 4-5 from three after shooting 22-70 and 8-32 respectively last Saturday. During this quick start Epps contributed 11 points and Peavy 10 of his own. For a moment it looked like Georgetown would run the Mountaineers off the floor in blowout fashion. To the Hoyas credit, they did, just not yet.
After racing out to their 16 point lead, the Hoyas went completely cold offensively, falling into a seven (7!) minute scoring drought where they turned the ball over seven times. As it has been seemingly every game to start the season, freshman forward Thomas Sorber got the Hoyas back on track. After the Mountaineers were able to pull the score to 25-17, Sorber came back in and put down two quick buckets, with a basket by sophomore forward Jordan Burks in between, to get the Hoyas back to life.
Over the final few minutes of the half the teams went back and forth and Georgetown entered the locker room up 35-22. Epps’ 11 points still led the game with the only Mountaineer above five points being sophomore guard Dallas Hobbs with an inefficient 7 points on nine shots.
The second half got off to a start very similar to how the first half ended, with Sorber exerting his will early and efficiently notching his second double-double of the season with an early basket inside to get him to 10 points and 10 rebounds with nearly the whole half remaining. Sophomore Drew Fielder even got in on the action with four early points of his own. Georgetown would extend their lead to 43-25 by the first media timeout at 15:34.
After 40 minutes of horrendous defense a game ago, the Hoyas did a complete one eighty with 30 minutes and counting of sound defense as the Mountaineers still had to struggle for every basket.
Scoring his twelfth point of the game on a two, Peavy reached 1,000 career points scored (across his three stops in college). The Hoyas were cruising at this point, the lead had ballooned to 58-32 with just under eight minutes to play, and all nine Hoyas who had seen action to that point had gotten into the scoring column.
As the minutes waned, the Hoya defense showed its first signs of weakness all game as the Mountaineers were able to take advantage of a Georgetown defense that was struggling to get back in transition. But for every Mountaineer make, the Hoyas had an answer as they pressed to a 68-41 lead with just four minutes remaining.
For the second time in five days, the final buzzer mercifully sounded at Capital One Arena. Fortunately for the Hoya faithful, this time it was the road team leaving in defeat. Your Georgetown Hoyas had come out on top by a score of 79-51.
Epps led the game in scoring with 19 as four Hoyas (Epps, Peavy, Sorber and sophomore guard Malik Mack) finished with double figures. Sorber would finish with a full stat line of 14 points, 12 rebounds, 5 assists and a steal.
After struggling out of the gate through three games, Ed Cooley’s squad had reminded the sparse crowd (including fewer than 50 students in attendance, save the pep band and cheerleaders), and those at home, that it’s far too early to give up on this inexperienced but talented team.
The Hoyas will stay at home for their second, and final, game of the Hoya MTE on Saturday, Nov. 23, taking on the St. Francis Red Flash (1-5, NEC) at 12:00 p.m. EST. The game will be broadcast on FS2. For continued coverage and updates on Georgetown sports, follow @GUVoiceSports on Twitter.
Tweet of the game: https://x.com/HoyaMentality/status/1859437573153632585
