Box Score
POUGHKEEPSIE, NY (February 1, 2008) -- After trailing for all but three minutes early in the game, the Vassar men's basketball team battled back to regain the lead with 1:30 left to play and refused to relinquish its advantage, holding on for a dramatic 72-65 victory over Union on Friday at the Athletics & Fitness Center.
Vassar improves to 13-3, 4-2 in the league and hosts Skidmore tomorrow. With the win, the Brewers are tied with Clarkson for third in the league, as well as snapping a Liberty League slump after dropping both conference games last weekend. The Dutchmen drop to 4-12, 0-6 in the Liberty League and look to notch their first conference victory at RPI on Saturday.
Trailing by as much as 11 points in the second half, the Brewers managed to cut the lead to one with 8:15 to play. After junior
Joe Davis (East Amherst, NY/St. Joseph's Institute) swatted away a Dutchman shot he raced to the other end where
Tyson Brazell (Salt Lake City, UT/Waterford School) found him for a two-handed dunk, igniting the crowd and cutting the Union lead to 51-50.
The Dutchmen managed to fend off the Brewers in the next couple minutes but the Vassar defense, led by senior Jon Swartz (Nanuet, NY/Nanuet), proved the difference in the game. In the final three minutes, Swartz nabbed five steals, all of them leading to Brewer baskets including three lay-ups of his own. Swartz gave Vassar its first lead of the half, 60-59, with a steal and lay-in with 1:30 to play. A repeat performance 35 seconds later gave Vassar a three-point lead. Not finished yet, Swartz picked off a Dutchman pass with 39 seconds to play and sent the ball up-court to
Lawrence Avitabile (Southington, CT/Southington). Avitabile sank the lay-up, along with drawing an intentional foul. The senior forward sank both free throws to convert the rare four-point play and give his team a 66-59 lead with 36 seconds to play, a deficit Union could not come back from.
The exciting finish followed a sloppy first half in which Union turned the ball over 15 times and Vassar had 16 turnovers. A lay-up by Avitabile just over three minutes into the game gave the Brewers a 6-2 lead, but Vassar would not score for the next five and a half minutes. However, with neither team taking care of the ball on offense, the Dutchmen were unable to pull away during Vassar's scoring drought. The Brewers managed to tie the game up on a Taylor Petrucelli (Stratford, CT/St. Joseph) three-pointer, knotting the low-scoring affair at 16 with 8:51 to play. However, ignited by seven points from sophomore Joey Lokitis (Norton, MA/Phillips Academy), the Dutchmen went on a 13-0 run in the next four minutes and a jumper by Delon McAllister (Irvington, NJ/The Hudson School) gave Union a 29-16 lead – its largest of the game – with 4:58 to play in the half. A block, an assist, and four points from Brazell in the next minute helped the Brewers cut the lead, and Vassar went into the locker room trailing 26-33.
Brazell led Vassar with a game-high 22 points, nailing 8-for-9 from the charity stripe. The senior guard is just two points away from reaching the 1,000 point milestone. Avitabile chipped in with an 18-point, 11-rebound double-double, the eighth of his season and the 35th of his career. Avitabile also dished out four assists. Swartz finished with nine points and five steals.
Union was led by a 19-point, six-rebound, four-steal performance from junior Drew Desmarais (St. James, NY/Smithtown). Lokitis chipped in with 16 points, while Drew Goldstein (Philadelphia, PA/The Haverford School) added 10 points, five assists, and four steals. Kyle Grimm (Sherrill, NY/Verona-Sherrill) pulled down 11 boards for the Dutchmen.
