America East Basketball News & Notes: Tournament Weekend is Over

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The Thanksgiving holiday weekend is over which means so too are the holiday tournaments that took place across the nation. America East had its fair share of teams that played in them. The results were not all that bad. The other bit of news is, the first NET ranking of the season came out. The league has some work to do in hopes of better numbers as the season moves along. Let’s look at how last week went for the conference.

In the polls, the league looks like this. In the Small Conference Top 25, UMass Lowell dropped a couple of spots from last week thanks to a couple of road losses to St.Louis and Central Connecticut State. They are at #9 beginning this week. Vermont, after their home win over Northeastern, is at #16. They are the only teams from the league in this poll. The NET ranking for the first week is not great. No team from America East is in the top-100. The best ranking belongs to the Maine Black Bears at #147. They are followed by Bryant at #156, UMass Lowell at #219, Vermont at #243, UAlbany at #247, UMBC at #319, Binghamton at #325, and NJIT at #353. As you can see, not the kind of numbers you want to see from the league. But it is only the first ranking and hopefully it gets better as the season moves along.

The tournament results were a little better, especially for two teams. First, the Maine Black Bears (5-4) spent the weekend in Philadelphia PA, in the Cathedral Classic played at one of the famous basketball venues in the northeast and eastern seaboard, the Palestra. The tournament was hosted by the University of Penn. The Black Bears went 2-1 in their three games played. They took victories over Elon On Friday by a 69-56 score. Guard Kellen Tynes led the way with a double-double of 14 points and 13 assists. Then on Sunday, the Black Bears took down Navy by a 71-66 count. Tynes was the leading scorer for Maine with 19 points. He was one of three starters who finished in double figures. The two wins were sandwiched around a loss to Penn, 77-64. Once again, Tynes was the leading score for the Black Bears with 15 points. For his play over the weekend Kellen Tynes was named the AE Player of the Week. In the tournament, Tymes averaged 16 points, 9 assists, 3.7 rebounds, and 4.7 steals. This is his first weekly award.

The Binghamton Bearcats (4-6) took part in the Lafayette Classic, hosted by Lafayette College and the Bearcats went 2-1 in the event. After losing to Niagara University on Friday by a 65-62 score, Binghamton came back and snapped a three-game losing streak with back-to-back overtime wins. On Saturday, they defeated Long Island University by a 75-70 score. Nehemiah Benson led the way with 28 points including 14-of-17 from the foul line. On Sunday, they defeated the host school Lafayette College 82-81. Tymu Chenery had a double-double of 21 points and 11 rebounds in 45 minutes of action. He was one of four players in double figures.

Some national ranking to consider. The UMass Lowell River Hawks are 45th in the nation in scoring offense at 84,2 points per game. The league has two in the blocks per game rankings, Bryant is at #13 in the country with 5.9 a game and Vermont is at #43 with 4.9 a game. UAlbany is tied for #36 in steals per game at 9.5 a game.

On the individual side of things, two forwards, Binghamton’s Gavin Walsh and UMass Lowell’s Max Brooks are tied for 7th in the country in double-doubles with four. Brooks is also tied for 6th in the country in blocked shots per game at 2.2. Connor Withers of Bryant is tied for 28th with 15, Walsh is tied for 22nd in rebounds per game at 9.5 while Tynes is tied for 21st in assists with 45. Earl Timeberlake is tied for 43rd with 41.

For the third time this season and second straight week, the America East Rookie of the Week is guard Martin Somerville of the River Hawks. He averaged 15.7 points and three rebounds, and seven steals in a 1-2 week for UMass Lowell. He shot 50% from three-point range (9-19) which included a career best six three pointers vs St. Louis last Wednesday night. Earlier in the week in a win over Merrimack, Somerville went for 13 points and was 2-of-3 from deep. Somerville is third on the team in scoring averaging 12.8 points per game.

Next week we will check in on the week ahead as we get closer to conference play.