St. Joe’s Haskins: ‘​I ​was ​just ​making ​shots’

The St. Joseph’s Hawks(14-8, 6-3) are playing great basketball right now, and that continued on Saturday when they went cross-town to face Big 5 and A-10 rival LaSalle(7-15, 3-6).

Behind 20 points from Dasear Haskins, who also had a career-high six threes, all in the first half, and 16 points from Jaiden Glover-Toscano, the Hawks defeated LaSalle 67-58 at John E. Glaser Arena.

With the win, the Hawks have won three straight and six of their last seven. 

Haskins, who also added a career-high 11 rebounds, carried the Hawks in the first half. He scored 20 of the team’s 36 first-half points. Going into halftime, the sophomore was 7/7 from the field, including 6/6 from deep, and St. Joe’s took a 36-29 lead into the break.

The Hawks made 14 threes against LaSalle.

According to Haskins, he played with a lot of confidence on Saturday.

“I ​just ​stay ​confident,” he said. “​I ​mean ​warm-ups ​are ​a ​little ​different ​today, ​but ​I ​was ​just ​confident ​in ​my ​shot ​that when ​my ​guys ​was ​cutting ​for ​me ​early, ​making ​it ​easy ​for ​me, ​and ​I ​was ​just ​making ​shots.”

In the second half, St. Joe’s had their largest lead of the game at 16 points after a Glover-Toscano three with just over six and a half minutes left in the game.

To their credit, the Explorers did battle back late, and after a Rob Dockery layup, who had game-highs of 26 points and 14 rebounds, LaSalle cut the lead to five with just under a minute to go. However, it was too little, too late. 

Dockery was the only player in double figures for the Explorers. LaSalle’s Jaeden Marshall finished 0/9 from the field.

For St. Joe’s, Derek Simpson added 13 points, and Justice Ajogbor added three blocks.

The Hawks return home on Wednesday when they play George Washington, while LaSalle goes on the road on Tuesday night to face Loyola-Chicago.