“Yeah, it happened early in the last game at Richmond,” he said. “It was on a free throw. I went in (for a rebound) and got scratched by No. 24.”
He was talking about the Spiders’ 6-foot-7 Isaiah Bigelow, who had a game-high 15 rebounds in the Spiders’ 69-64 upset of UD three nights earlier.
“It stung a little bit, but it didn’t bleed much,” he said. “I just kept playing.”
The discolorations already have faded and the scratch now has scabbed over.
What a difference a year makes.
Last season, when he was with the Pitt Panthers, the bruises and sting didn’t go away so easily.
This time last year he was seeing his already limited playing time dwindling to almost nothing for the last six weeks of the season.
Compared to Tuesday night, when he played just over 30 minutes and had 17 points in the first half alone, last season — in the final game of January against the Miami Hurricanes — Santos played only two minutes and did not score.
In the Panthers’ final 13 games that came after that, he didn’t play in four of them — both ACC Tournament games, the First Four victory over Mississippi State at UD Arena and the NCAA Tournament loss to Xavier in the Round of 32 — and he played two minutes or less in four of the others; and didn’t score in six games.
“This time last year were you already thinking about transferring?”
When he hesitated, I tried nudging him: “Answer truthfully.”
With another pause, he finally offered: “I tried not to think about it too much. It can be easy to think negatively and say to yourself, ‘I’m not in the game. The coach doesn’t think I’m good enough.’ Blah…blah, blah. So, I tried to focus on just being where my feet were.
“But truthfully, as a basketball player, it’s always in the back of your mind. You are a competitor. You want to be out there helping your team.
“You just want an opportunity. You want to play.”
He’s gotten a golden opportunity with the Flyers this season and he’s playing at a high level, especially in the first half Tuesday.
His 17 points before the break — over one-third of the points he scored all last season — came on 6-for 8 shooting from the field, including a perfect 3-for-3 effort from three-point range.
Each of those treys he celebrated with what has become his signature of the moment. As soon as the ball rips the net cords, he does a quick kiss of his fingers and raises his arm with three fingers pointing toward the heavens.
“I just adopted that this year,” he said with a smile. “I think it was the Northwestern game (Nov. 10) when I finally hit a three.”
Credit: David Jablonski
Credit: David Jablonski
Last season he made just 5 of 32 three-point attempts (15.6 percent.) This season he’s made 31 of 69 (44.9 percent)
In a year’s time he’s made amazing upgrades no matter where you look on the stat sheet.
As a sophomore last season at Pitt, he averaged 12.8 minutes, 2.8 points and 1.3 rebounds a game.
Now he leads the 17-3, No. 21 ranked Flyers in minutes played — he averages 33.1 a game — and is second on the team in scoring (11.6 points per game) and rebounds (6.7).
“Nate does a lot of things well,” said teammate DaRon Holmes II, who led the Flyers with 25 points and 12 rebounds Tuesday. “He does it all really.
“He’s an elite shooter. He’s a leader. (And) he gives us a lot of toughness. Nate does a lot of things not all our teammates…”
Holmes didn’t finish that thought, which could have ended “are able to do” or “want to do.”
More than just theatrics from beyond the arc and heroics at game’s end — he hit the winning basket with 4 seconds left against LSU — he’s the guy muscling for rebounds inside.
He had 14 in his Flyers’ debut against SIUE and 13 three games later against Youngstown State. He’s now 11th in the Atlantic 10 in rebounding.
Looking for an opportunity
When he decided to transfer after last season, Santos said he heard from several schools and ended up visiting Toledo, High Point, Buffalo, Boston College and finally UD, which had recruited him out of high school, as well.
“I was just looking for an opportunity and that’s what I told a lot of the coaches who talked to me,” he said. “I told them I didn’t have the best opportunity (at Pitt) and I felt I had a lot of things I could bring to a team.”
He felt his past was prelude to what would come.
He had an impressive high school resume — starring at Geneva in Illinois and then at Loomis Chaffee, a prep school in Connecticut — and he certainly had the genes.
His mom, Lori, was a rebounding machine at Wichita State. She led the Gateway Conference in rebounds as a freshman and was named one of the top first-year players in the nation.
His dad, Jose (Joe), played at Southern Nazarene College and in Puerto Rico on the national team and as a pro.
Nate’s older siblings all played college ball as well: Ashley at Marquette and Louisiana Tech; his other sister, Sidney, played at Oakland and his brother, KJ, was at UIC and Missouri.
Credit: David Jablonski
He liked UD when visited and signed in June, the last of a quartet of transfers who have been instrumental in lifting the Flyers to national prominence this season.
Three of them start — Javon Bennett (a Merrimack transfer); Enoch Cheeks (Robert Morris) and Santos — and 6-11 Isaac Jack (Buffalo) is backing up Holmes who, it was announced Tuesday night, had made the Wooden Award Late Season Top 20 list.
The award designates the top player in college basketball each season.
Holmes though didn’t talk about that after the game and instead patted Santos on the back:
“He really helps our team. He’s such a great player to play with.”
After Santos’s scoring outburst in the first half — 14 of his points came in the last 7:29 — George Washington paid more attention to him after the break, and he took just two more shots and finished with 17 points.
But that only further paved the way for Holmes, whom the Revolutionaries could not stop .
Holmes scored 16 of his points in the second half and that was while playing under 13 minutes.
After the game, Chris Caputo, the coach of the 14-7 Revolutionaries, said Dayton was the best team they’ve played this season and Holmes was the best player they’ve played against.
And that’s why Santos is lobbying his dad to come to UD Arena.
“My mom’s been here and my brother has to, but not him,” he said. “I want him to come see the environment. I want him to see our team.”
Something to prove
Santos said the loss to Richmond — a setback that snapped the Flyers 13-game winning streak — has “added a chip on our shoulder.”
At the Richmond game, he heard the Spiders’ students chant “overrated” and then saw the Flyers drop in the Associated Press poll from No. 16 to 21.
“I think we all had something to prove today,” he said. “We still had that stinging feeling from the last game.”
Along with Holmes and Santos, the Flyers also were led by Koby Brea, who went 5 for 9 from beyond the arc and finished with 17 points. Afterward Caputo raved about him, and Holmes saluted him and Santos.
“I feel like Koby Brea and Nate are two of the best shooters in the country — especially when they get hot,” Holmes said. “When it goes up, I always feel like it’s going in. I don’t even feel like I need to rebound when they shoot the ball.”
As Holmes was saying that during their segment of the press conference, Santos’s face lit up with a smile and you never noticed the bruising or the scrape.
What a difference a year makes.
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