Rowan men’s basketball wins its third straight game 78-63 after a second half takeover at home against Rutgers-Camden on Wednesday, Dec. 4, 2024.

After a first half where the Profs just couldn’t pull away, Khalif Meares and Taz Cantey took over offensively, converting 17 of the team’s 27 total field goals.  

“We had to move the ball more [in the first],” head coach Eric Brennan said. “We were stagnant offensively. I thought we looked horrible. I think everybody in the gym could see it. Everybody felt like they had the mismatch. That comes with our system where I give guys a lot of freedom. They didn’t play well with that freedom in the first half. We need to get it side to side and just start sharing the ball more. We can’t have a guy dribble for ten seconds. Everyone knows he’s going to drive it.”

Rowan took a 40-36 lead into the half, but it easily could’ve been a blowout already. The Profs had some short runs and played well defensively, but the ball would not find the bottom of the net. The ball-movement wasn’t great early on either, as isolation led to good shots, but not necessarily easy shots.  

“Defensively, I was happy with it.” Brennan said. “36 points, not too bad. A couple possessions you want to get back, but that was the message. Start sharing the ball. We recruit that way for a reason and the guys have to buy into that and make the right play.” 

The second half came together nicely for Rowan, with an 11-0 run in four minutes coming out of the break.  The defense continued to deliver, but the ball movement had improved, and the Profs were getting easy opportunities in transition. 

“What I was even more excited about was that they [Rutgers-Camden] didn’t score for their first four and a half minutes,” Brennan said. “I knew if our defense could stay solid, then the offense would correct itself. Some nights you’re not going to hit shots that you typically do. Brycen [Williams] struggled; he had a lot of good looks. I thought early we all had a lot of good looks, but in the second half we got it moving.”

Meares led all scorers with 23 points, followed by Cantey with 21, on an astonishing 9-11 shooting. Cantey scored all of his points in the paint or via free throws, showing that he can bully smaller guards and finish through contact inside. 

“I’m a bigger guard,” Cantey said. “I definitely try to use my body on smaller guards to save energy and it can be easy. Sometimes I take what they give me but sometimes I’m like, let me go in the post and he’s a smaller guard, so get fouled and make the layup.”

Cantey, the junior transfer from Holy Family University, is starting to find his rhythm with his new team, scoring 43 points in his last two contests, and solidifying himself as a key offensive piece to the new-look Profs.  

“I’m definitely finding my groove,” Cantey said. “Every day we get better. We’re playing for something bigger than just ourselves. We’re playing our team and once we all click, like coach said, we don’t want to play our best basketball now, we want to play it in March, so we’re looking to get better every single day. It’s about the whole team clicking together. I learn how they play, and they learn how I play, so that’s the point I’m going to try to make.”

Meares scored 14 in the second half, driving through the lane and making acrobatic finishes that left the Scarlet Raptors in awe.  

“I think I had a poor first half,” Meares said. “Second half, I just said to myself I had to pick it up a little bit. I was a little rusty in the first half. We were just slow. We came out flat in the first half. It was real quiet, we just had to pick up the pace and pick up the noise.”

Meares played a huge role offensively and defensively in the second half, turning defense into offense, and making timely buckets every time Rutgers-Camden tried to fight back.  

“My coach always has trust in me to make the right plays,” Meares said. “Some plays might be forced, but it’s just me being overly aggressive. Coach trusted me to get the job done.”

Rowan sits at 2-0 in the New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) and they’ll have their first conference road game this Saturday against NJCU. Brennan hasn’t seen the full potential of the squad yet, and hopes that as the season goes on, each game will show the team coming together more and more.

“I don’t know if we’re top competition,” Brennan said. “I think we’re getting there. I’ll tell you what, it feels better starting 2-0 [in conference] than the 0-2 last year. I think there’s a lot of work our group has to do. The NJAC is going to be competitive every night. We go up to Jersey City on Saturday. That’s never an easy one. I like the direction we’re going in, but we have to keep building off of each day. We don’t want to be playing our best basketball now; it has to happen in January and February.”

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