St. Francis’ Craig Cranks It Up for League Play

St. Francis High basketball Coach John Jordan approached Dave Craig with a challenge recently. If the struggling Golden Knights were to win, Jordan told his senior forward, Craig must improve on his 11.1 points-a-game scoring average.

Message received.

In two games last week, Craig scored 56 points, including 27 in the Golden Knights’ 64-62 upset of St. John Bosco, one of the state’s top Division II teams.

In St. Francis’ 70-56 victory over Bosco Tech on Friday, Craig scored 29 points and grabbed 16 rebounds, leading St. Francis to a 3-0 start in its first season in the Del Rey League. The Golden Knights are 8-7 overall.

“I’ve been waiting for this,” Jordan said. “The numbers don’t surprise me. He is capable of that almost every game.”

But until last week, Craig had not done much. None of the Golden Knights had. St. Francis went 5-7 through its nonleague schedule.

“In the preseason, we were all worried about ourselves,” Craig said. “We didn’t have the killer instinct. Coach said it takes some teams two or three games to come together, but it took us 12.”

Craig, who averaged about 20 minutes a game as a junior, explained his resurgence in terms of the team. He played his best basketball last week, he said, simply because the team was playing its best.

“I don’t make the passes to myself,” he said. “There are four other guys out there who have to make the plays.”

Forward Ryan Weisenberg, one of Craig’s closest friends on the team, reasoned that once the team started to play well, Craig’s numbers would improve. “It was kind of the team’s fault that he wasn’t getting more points because we weren’t playing together,” he said.

The Knights jelled just in time: a league opener on the road against highly rated St. John Bosco.

Craig, who is 6-foot-6, 210 pounds but as much a threat from the outside as under the basket, said the week of practice before the St. John Bosco game was one of the most intense of the season. Jordan said the team seemed more focused. When the Golden Knights took the floor at St. John Bosco, there were feelings of anxiety but not intimidation. “We knew if we didn’t play our best game, they were going to kill us,” Weisenberg said.

Craig, who is generally relaxed before games and then works himself into an intense state as the game begins, steadily poured in baskets. The longer the Golden Knights stayed close, the more confidence they gained.

“As the game progressed, (Craig) started making some really good shots,” guard Jon Morales said. “He really picked up as the game went on. We were surprised how we could keep up with them at first, then we started to think we could win.”

Said Weisenberg: “Without (Craig), we would have probably gotten beat by 20.”

Having led the Golden Knights past St. John Bosco, the next question was: Could he do it again?

Not that he’s superstitious, but he said he wore the same underwear against Bosco Tech. Just to be sure.

Craig improved his scoring and rebounding against the Tigers. He even made four three-point shots. In the two games, Craig made 23 of 45 shots (51.1%) from the field.

Finally. The Dave Craig his teammates were waiting for had arrived.

“We expected it,” Morales said. “We just didn’t know when it would kick in.”