DePaul starts fast, holds off Loyola

As it turned out, playing on the road wasn’t the only explanation for Loyola’s slow start.

While construction crews finished renovation of Gentile Arena, the Ramblers played six of their first seven games away from home and posted a 1-6 record.

Back in its own arena Wednesday, Loyola was overrun by DePaul’s pressure defense in the first half. The Blue Demons opened a 47-17 lead at intermission and held on for a 69-58 victory.

“It’s one of the best halves I’ve had a team play defensively,” DePaul coach Oliver Purnell said. “It took them out of their offense. It created some offense for us, created some tempo. Defensively, it was spectacular.”

Loyola’s new arena looks nothing like the old Gentile Center, essentially a concrete box with bleachers. Now it has bowl seating on all four sides of the court and theater seats. It’s small — with a capacity around 4,000 — but certainly unique.

“It’s going to be a neat home court for them,” Purnell said. “They’re going to have some great games in there as the years go on. I was in here once or twice years ago. I just remember it not being very nice, and (now) it’s nice, very nice.”

The building was nearly full for the city rivalry and everyone involved praised the atmosphere.

“It’s hard not to visualize what could be,” first-year Loyola coach Porter Moser said. “Very disappointed in our focus coming out. We got caught up in the atmosphere.”

Loyola shot just 19.2 percent from the field in the first half (5-for-26). DePaul tried to focus on a fast start after falling way behind early in the previous two games, losses to Milwaukee and Mississippi.

“We saw the atmosphere when we got here and realized it was going to be something serious,” DePaul guard Jeremiah Kelly said.

The Blue Demons (5-3) started with a quick 10-2 lead and steadily built their advantage. The lead actually peaked at 52-19 when freshman Jamee Crockett knocked down a 3-pointer at the 18:41 mark of the second half.

But DePaul didn’t score again for more than eight minutes and a 17-0 Loyola run cut the deficit below 20. The Ramblers got to 57-45 with 5:52 left on a follow slam by Ben Avercamp, but it wasn’t enough.

By the time Loyola trimmed the lead to single digits, though, only 28.9 seconds remaining.

Senior forward Walt Gibler poured in 29 points to lead the Ramblers.

Moses Morgan scored 13 points, leading four DePaul players in double figures.