America East Basketball News and Notes: A New Partnership

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Another good week of college basketball for teams in the America East. A couple of teams also have winning streaks alive. The conference also sent their first team to a partnership event between the league and Jersey Mike’s. Happy Thanksgiving to fans of America East hoops. Here is some of what is happening around the league.

The first of those teams that has a winning streak alive is the Binghamton Bearcats who’s current run stands at three in a row. After wins over NJIT and Army last week and with their good play, the team has captured both of the weekly awards. Sophomore guard Sam Sessoms from Philadelphia, PA. is this Player of the Week. He averaged 24.5 points, 7.5 rebounds, and 6 assists in those two wins. Sessoms had a big night vs NJIT as he went for a double-double of 33 points, a season-high, and 12 rebounds. 27 of those came in the second half. He dished out five assists as well and the Bearcats would need every one of his points. With 2.2 seconds left in the game, Sessoms would score the game-winning basket on a layup to give his team a comeback win. He followed that up with 16 points and seven assists in a win over the Black Knights.

The Rookie of the Week is teammate Brenton Mills. The freshman out of Allen, Texas averaged 16 points in those two wins. He shot 52% from the field in those games (11-of-21). Mills dropped 17 on NJIT then added 15 more against Army. For both players, this is their first weekly awards in their careers.

The Stony Brook Seawolves have won five in a row beating Wagner 87-84 to extend the streak. They are third in the conference in margin of victory at 7.3 averaging 72.1 on offense and allowing 64.9 on defense. They are the best free-throw shooting team in the early stages of the season shooting at 73%, 99 for 135. Stony Brook is second in the league in both offensive rebounds at 12.1 per game through seven games (85 total) and defensive rebounding 28.3 (198 total). If there is a problem for the Seawolves, it could be their assists to turnover ratio which stands at 84 assists to 95 turnovers. That’s a ratio of 0.88 which is dead last in the league.

The UMass Lowell River Hawks snapped a three-game losing streak on Wednesday night with a 12-point win over the Brown Bears. They are leading America East in offensive rebounding at 12.3 per game. They are averaging a Division I best 40 boards a game with a +3.6 rebounding margin. The River Hawks are ranked 16th in the nation in total rebounds at 280 and 21st in total assists with 107. Christian Lutete, who is 23 points away from a thousand for his career, is ranked third in total points with 151, and 20th in points per game at 21.6.

UHN’s Sean Sutherlin is 8th in scoring at 15.6 per contest while leading the conference in rebounding averaging 9.9 a ballgame. He is 5th in field goal percentage at .523 and is logging big minutes for the Wildcats at 33.3 minutes a contest. Sean is getting help from a couple of mates. Nick Guadarrama leads in 3-point field goal percentage at .483 (14-for-29) and is third in field goal percentage at .547 (41-for-75) while also logging 33.3 minutes a game. Mark Carbone is second in free-throw shooting at .929 (13-for-14).

The partnership we spoke of at the beginning of this piece is with the Jersey Mike Jamaica Classic. The league will serve as the official NCAA sponsoring organization for this event. The classic, which just finished up its third year, gives the league a chance to have a member of the league in this classic every year. Maryland-Baltimore County was there last weekend and played two games vs Eastern Michigan and Nicholls State. Both games ended up in losses for UMBC, but this event will give the conference a bigger stage to showcase their member teams.

Next week, more from America East hoops.