“It’s like a Great Dane chasing you around the backyard,” Harper said of Bailey’s performance.
It was a day for Rutgers’ big dogs, for sure. Harper was treated to a standing ovation as he checked out for the final time with 2 minutes left. He said he noticed fans getting louder as he approached the triple-double. They were willing him to the achievement.
“The crowd was great,” he said. ” I definitely didn’t expect a crowd like this on Christmas break.”
No Rutgers fan should dismiss this win as beating up on lowly competition. Columbia came in with an 11-1 record and a victory at Villanova. The Lions boasted a top-100 offense and a nucleus that’s been together for three full seasons, making them the fourth-most experienced team in Division I.
This was a dissection of a squad that could challenge Princeton for the Ivy League title.
Afterward Columbia coach Jim Engles, a Morris County resident who built NJIT from scratch before moving to Morningside Heights, had some interesting thoughts about program-building in the age of free agency.
“One of the reasons we’ve been good this year is a lot of the teams we’re playing, they’re building rosters from the start,” Engles said. “You’re taking new guys from different programs, different cultures, and you’re trying to build everything sort of on the run, and I think that’s one of the advantages we have. We’ve been building our culture over the last three or four years and these guys have really bought into it, so you know it’s something you can hang your hat on. A lot of these (other coaches) now have to build their cultures on the fly and that’s so challenging – I’m not really sure how they do it.”
That’s certainly the biggest challenge Pikiell is facing this season, and although he’s far from alone, he’s a guy who has been at his best when his culture seeps in bone-deep over a few seasons with the same cast. Obviously, there’s no time for that this season.
2. Jamichael Davis contributes again
After a solid performance against Princeton (6 points, 4 steals, 3 assists, 3 rebounds), the sophomore guard remained in the starting lineup against Columbia and delivered 11 points on 4-of-8 shooting, 7 assists, 3 steals and 3 rebounds while committing no turnovers over 28 minutes. His plus/minus was a whopping plus-28, second on the team to Harper’s plus-29.
“Plus-28, you don’t see that often,” Harper said. “That’s my dog…When he’s on his A-game, we’re unstoppable.”
Added Bailey: “We know he can play like that every game. He’s just got to keep doing it.”
3. Full house, and a memorable moment
It feels like an entire fan base is waiting on edge for this team to hit stride.
All you need to know about fan interest in this Rutgers squad is that 8,000 supporters filled about every seat by 5 p.m., Monday tip-off against Columbia. And the student section was packed with actual students during break (some years, non-students infiltrate the baseline section during the holiday week).
Though the building was full, you could feel the nerves from the crowd as Columbia hung around early on. Eventually, that nervous energy got channeled into celebratory cheers as Harper approached and then reached the triple-double.
Then the roof blew off when freshman walk-on Peter Noble, a Christian Brothers Academy grad, drilled a 30-foot 3-pointer from the Jersey Mike’s logo along the right wing with 10 seconds left. Last season Noble was a CBA teammate of Steve Pikiell’s son Kevin, so that was a pretty cool moment for the Pikiells — and for everybody in the gym Monday. College basketball might be professionalizing before our eyes, but there are still aspects of it that no other sport can match and this was a shining example.
4. Is Rutgers ready?
It’s 18 straight Big Ten games from here on out. At 8-5 overall and 1-1 in the Big Ten, with young talent showing flashes, Rutgers probably has a 50/50 shot of making the NCAA Tournament. There are plenty of opportunities for needle-moving wins ahead, but the Scarlet Knights have to start stacking them soon.
Asked if his squad is ready for the meat grinder, Pikiell replied, “We’ve been in the meat grinder, so I feel pretty confident in that way. We’ve played the best schedule since I’ve been here. We went on the road and we challenged ourselves. And I think we learned a lot. We’ve got to be consistent. Today we took the giant step of being consistent the entire game.”
Rutgers handed out 26 assists while committing just 4 turnovers on the evening, and held Columbia to 32 percent shooting in the second half, consistently disrupting the Lions’ cutters. Columbia is not Michigan State or Oregon, but the Lions run a well-oiled offense. So these are good signs as the calendar flips.
“I think we’ve been ready,” Harper said. “Coach Pike and the rest of the staff did a great job of scheduling games to put us through the fire. We’ve seen everything – we’re ready to get this thing rolling.”
Asked about how this group has responded to taking some surprising losses, Harper replied: “At the end of the day you can’t take a loss back. You can make the future better, but you can’t take back the past. That’s the way I look at it.”
Asked about palpable fan angst after losing to Princeton, Harper said he understood it.
“As you can see, people get nervous, but that’s just the nature of the game,” he said. “Everything is not going to go in your favor. Just try to stay level-headed and know that it’s a long season – it’s only December. We haven’t even made it to January yet. The games we lost, it’s not like we got blown out. We go out there and compete, I think we can compete against anyone in the country.”
Asked if he’s concerned about Rutgers’ NCAA Tournament chances, Harper maintained his game face.
“I don’t worry about that at all,” he said. “We’re in December. We’re just going to get better. That’s all we can do.”
5. On to Indiana, the best medicine
Throughout the past seven seasons, the best medicine for Rutgers basketball has been facing Indiana. The Scarlet Knights are 6-2 against the once-mighty Hoosiers since 2018, and they’re headed to Bloomington to begin the teeth of the Big Ten slate Thursday (8:30 p.m., Big Ten Network). Over that span Indiana’s had plenty of talent on the floor – but routinely gets outhustled and outmuscled by the Scarlet Knights.
One of the most classic moments in Rutgers’ recent ownership of this series came in 2022 in Bloomington when Ron Harper Jr., exasperated by the nastiness of the taunts leveled at him by the student section, took a bow and gestured to his crotch after hitting a game-winning 3-pointer. That was out of character for Dylan’s typically stoic big brother.
“That shot was on my birthday – that was a pretty special moment,” Dylan recalled. “He was like, that’s your birthday present.”
Dylan, who was heavily recruited by the Hoosiers, said he expects to hear it from the Indiana faithful Thursday.
“This is stuff you come here for,” he said. “Rutgers is in a great spot, we have a great responsibility and a great opportunity.”
A fashionable, if misguided, preseason pick to win the Big Ten, Indiana (10-3 overall, 1-1 Big Ten) hasn’t shown much, losing by 17 at Nebraska and by a combined 44 points to Gonzaga and Louisville in the Bahamas.
The Hoosiers are poorly coached and undisciplined once again under NBA guy Mike Woodson, with the latest rudderless sign coming Sunday afternoon. They squeezed by Winthrop at home after star big man Oumar Ballo (12.4 ppg, 9.2 rpg) did not play for undisclosed reasons – but was photographed at a local bar around midnight on the eve of the contest.
It would be surprising if Ballo doesn’t play against the Scarlet Knights, but as long as Woodson shows up, Rutgers will have a better-than-decent chance at continuing to spank those candy-striped pants.
Jerry Carino has covered the New Jersey sports scene since 1996 and the college basketball beat since 2003. Contact him at jcarino@gannettnj.com.
