DES MOINES, Iowa – The Drake University men's basketball used a 13-0 run to start the second half and blow past Central College, 90-70, Sunday afternoon in an exhibition contest at the Knapp Center. The run was part of a larger 23-1 spurt that began at the end of the first half to allow the Bulldogs to comfortably pull away in first-year head coach Ray Giacoletti's debut on the Drake bench.

Drake was led offensively by its senior backcourt duo, Gary Ricks, Jr. (Los Angeles, Calif.) and Richard Carter (Detroit, Mich.) who scored 19 and 15 points, respectively. In his return to the team following a season off, senior Aaron Hawley (Rogers, Ark.) scored 10 points and led the team along with freshman Jacob Jensen (Lunderskov, Denmark) with six rebounds each. Freshman Blake Danielak (Georgetown, Texas) also finished with double-digit scoring with 12 points.

“It was fun, to get out there for the first time in front of the crowd and try to show them a little preview of what we hope we can do this year,” Ricks said.

The Bulldogs overcame early shooting woes to finish shooting 45 percent (30-of-66) from the field, including a 60 percent clip from beyond the arc. Drake held a 38-31 advantage on the glass, and forced 22 Dutch turnovers. 

“I think there were a lot of positives in limiting ourselves to nine turnovers, which was huge, while creating 22,” Giacoletti said. “We outrebounded them but need to do a better job and our goal is to try to keep teams to less than 60 points defensively. Obviously we didn't do that tonight.”

Drake came out firing in the second half, scoring eight quick points to open a 15-point lead, forcing Central to call a timeout with 18:26 on the clock. The Dutch were not able to make any successful adjustments out of the timeout, being held scoreless for almost four minutes of game time and watching Drake use a 23-1 run, which started in the first half, to take a commanding 22-point lead early in the second half.

Nile Eckerman led the Dutch with 20 points and was followed by Matt Greenfield who had 15. Yaw Sapon-Amoah also scored in double figures with 11 points and led his team with six boards. Greenfield had 10 of his points early in the game and was a main reason the Dutch were able to stay close early, but was shut down by the Drake defense for the latter part of the game.

“Central did a nice job,” Giacoletti said. “They've got a couple guys that can really shoot the basketball. We had to do something that's a little different in switching on the 1-to-4 ball screens. On defense, tt's about communicating and trying to get a group of five people to work as one.”

Although Drake struggled to create separation from Central on the scoreboard for most of the first half, the Bulldogs finished the half on a 10-2 run after trailing the Dutch, 29-28, with 3:19 on the clock. Despite its early struggles from the field, Drake was able to maintain a lead for the majority of the half by forcing turnovers and scoring 15 points off of 14 Central miscues. The plus-10 turnover margin in Drake's advantage proved to be the difference in the half, as the Bulldogs held on to a 38-31 lead at the break, despite being outperformed by Central's shooters.  

Drake starts regular season on Saturday, traveling to Chicago to face UIC at 7 p.m. on Nov. 9. Fans can follow the action through the radio broadcast on KRNT 1350 AM or through live stats available on www.GoDrakeBulldogs.com.

“I think we got better from last Sunday to this Sunday and we're going to need to get better from this Sunday to Saturday at UIC,” Giacoletti said.