The Rowan men’s basketball team notched a key conference win over Kean by a final score of 76-66 in front of an energetic home crowd at Esbjornson Gym on Wednesday, Feb. 5. The win improved Rowan to 12-9 on the season and 9-5 in New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) play. 

Khalif Meares was key to the win, tallying 24 points on an efficient 75% shooting with 17 of those points coming in the second half. Meares was especially crucial at the end, helping close out Kean after the Cougars trimmed Rowan’s lead to just five with 2:34 to go in the second half. A subsequent Meares layup and three-pointer secured the victory. He talked about his mentality as a scorer in close games. 

“I feel like I just gotta stay ready because you never know what can happen,” Meares said. “We can be up 10 and then down two in the next three minutes, so we just gotta stay positive and stay together.”

Rowan led by two at halftime before three-pointers by Brycen Williams and Danny Fleming triggered an 18-2 run to give Rowan their largest lead of 18. Fleming contributed 16 points and added two blocks before fouling out with seven minutes to go while Williams had 15 points of his own. Head coach Eric Brennan talked about how he felt his team performed.

“I liked how our guys defended tonight, one of our best defensive performances on the season,” Brennan said. “They have four guards that can really score and you didn’t see much of that tonight. You gotta make some shots as well and our guys did a good job of that tonight.”

Rowan trailed Kean 22-13 with 9:47 to go in the first half before the Profs went on a 15-3 run. The two teams then traded buckets with Rowan closing out the half up 34-32. Fleming paced all scorers with 13 in the first half and the Rowan defense forced six Kean first-half turnovers. 

With the NJAC playoffs coming up, Brennan talked about the importance of getting a win and getting a step closer to solidifying their playoff berth.

“You got seven teams fighting for six spots, including Kean so this was a big one for us,” Brennan said. “They were a game ahead of us and now we’re even and hold the tie-breaker over them. These next four games are going to be super competitive and teams are going to be moving up and down, so we’ll see where it all falls.”

“It’s very important but we just gotta keep taking it one game at a time and keep moving up in the standings,” Meares added. 

Taz Cantey recorded 10 points and Chris McCarron had seven points off the bench, helping Rowan to have a balanced scoring attack with many players getting involved. Rowan shot 56 percent from the field and 43 percent from three while holding Kean to just 41 percent from the field. 

Next up, Rowan will travel to face another tough conference opponent in Ramapo. The game will be played on Saturday, Feb. 8 at 1:00 p.m.