La Salle Basketball: Ash Howard earns first win as Explorers end drought

La Salle Basketball has begun their new era under Ashley Howard slower than expected, earning their first win of the 2018-19 NCAA basketball season in late December.

When La Salle boosters and faculty showered Ashley Howard in blue and gold streamers when he was introduced as the Explorers’ head coach in April, no one thought he would be looking for his first win at Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City a few days before Christmas. La Salle finally cracked the win column on Friday, topping still-winless Alabama A&M 80-57. The Explorers took the lead for good at the 12:08 mark in the first half when David Beatty hit a three to put La Salle ahead 15-12. While the victory that set them up for a Battle at the Boardwalk championship game with Towson came as easily as Explorers fans could have hoped, nothing else has been simple in the first eleven games of Howard’s tenure.

Ash Howard, who played his college ball on the other side of town at Drexel, was hired from Jay Wright’s championship staff in April after John Giannini, who had coached the Explorers since 2004, was terminated following last season. Many felt Giannini had done the best he could with the program given La Salle’s facilities, which are generally regarded as below average, and the school’s resources, which had at one point become so scarce that La Salle cut tuition by almost 30% to improve enrollment, and sold artwork to fund expansion projects. He attracted many high level Philadelphia area recruits to campus, almost all of whom were transfers looking to return to Philadelphia after starting their college careers elsewhere, including current starters Pookie Powell and Traci Carter. He also led the Explorers to an at-large tournament bid and Sweet 16 appearance in 2013.

But La Salle made an important statement about their expectations only about a year after rumors floated that the school might seek to de-emphasize athletics, and either look for membership in a less competitive conference or drop division one status altogether. The proud program was not satisfied with one tournament appearance and no conference championships (they haven’t won a single A10 title since joining the league in 1995) in the decade and a half of Giannini’s term, and they were going to look for a way bring the program to the upper tier of the Atlantic 10.

There were no red flags when La Salle opened the year against crosstown rival Temple, losing by 8 and holding a lead for much of the first half. But when the Explorers couldn’t take care of Lafayette in their home opener a few days later, it looked like there might be a longer-than-expected adjustment period for the group to learn Howard’s Villanova-style offense, and perhaps for Ashley himself to find a winning formula on the sidelines. They would go on to lose to Drexel on their home court at Gola Arena for a second straight season, and would only come within single digits of an opponent once more, losing by 7 to Villanova at the Palestra early in December, until they finally got over the hump against Alabama A&M.

La Salle is now the consensus pick to finish dead last in the 14 team Atlantic 10, three years after their 4-14 league season stuck them in the conference’s basement most recently in 2016. But La Salle is certainly not the least talented team in the conference, and now with a full lineup, two months of adjustment to Ash Howard’s program, and with the monkey of winlessness finally off their back, the Explorers might be set up to surprise a few people after the New Year.