
Bryant and Maine continued their winning ways last week while the middle of the pack is trying to keep pace. For all teams, the first half of the conference season ends on Saturday. This has the makings of a better league than people give it credit for. So let’s see where we are to this point.
While the rankings for this week are not great, they are what you would expect from a one-bid league. In the NET rankings only two teams, Bryant at #157, and Maine at #183 are inside the top 200. In the KenPom, Bryant is at #153, UMass Lowell is at #184, and Maine is at #194. Not great rankings to be sure, but these teams have been playing some good basketball this year.
Maine (13-8, 5-1) had only one league game last week on the road at UMass Lowell on Thursday night. Heading into that game, the River Hawks were 15-7 all-time against the Black Bears. On Thursday night, it would take extra basketball to decide it and Maine came out on top. Despite giving up 50 points in the paint to UML, the Black Bears found a way to pull off the win. A.L. Lopez had 27 points, Quion Burns added 28, and Kellen Tynes had 18 before fouling out in OT. In a game that had 9 ties and 11 lead changes, the Black Bears left the court winners. They came back from down four twice in overtime. The last time with 44 seconds left. Lopez scored the final five points to give his team a much-deserved win on the road.
Bryant (12-9, 6-0) kept their win streak alive with a couple of wins. First, they traveled to Durham, NH to take on the Wildcats. The 95-76 win was paced by 6th senior Connor Withers who had 27 points. He was helped by Rafael Pinzon with 18 and Barry Evans also with 18 points. The trio was too much for UNH to handle last Thursday night. The Wildcats did get a double-double from Khalil Badru of 11 points and 10 boards. As well as 22 off the bench from Anthony McCombs III. But it was not enough. The key stat was the Bulldogs getting 24 points off 13 New Hampshire turnovers.
Bryant returned home to face Binghamton on Saturday afternoon and took that one by an 83-69 score. All five starters finished in double figures led by Pinzon with 30 on 11-of-21 shooting, 4-of-8 from deep, and 4-4 from the foul line. Earl Timberlake had a double-double of 10 points and 12 rebounds, his 7th of the season. This was a game of which starting five would be better. In the end, the Bulldogs just put up more points than the Bearcats.
UMBC (11-10, 3-3) had a solid week. winning twice. First, in overtime over UAlbany on the road 92-87. They outscored the Great Danes by a 13-8 margin in the extra session. Bryce Johnson led four of the five starters in double figures with 23 points. UAlbany got 25 from Amar’e Marshall. One of three starters in double-figures. The key stat of this game was foul shooting. UMBC was 11-of-14 while UAlbany was 0-for-6 in OT. Then on Saturday, UMBC made its way to Burlington, Vermont and took care of the Catamounts. The 80-63 score may be a little shocking to some, however, UMBC shot 57.7% from the field. Johnson had 26 points and Josh Odunowo had a double-double of 19 points and 10 rebounds. Vermont did have four starters in double figures for the game. But they gave up 40 points in the paint. It is not often you see the Catamounts get handled like this at home.
Congratulations are in order for 5th-year senior Quinton Mincey of UMass Lowell (14-7, 3-3). In the loss to Maine last Thursday night, Mincey went over the 1,000-point mark with his 20-point night. He would follow that up with another 20 points vs UNH on Saturday in a River Hawks win. He now stands at 1,025 points for his career.
Black Bears guard Kellen Tynes leads the league with six assists per game as well as assists per game (total) with 5.2. A.J. Lopez leads the league in 3-point shooting at 57.1%. Tynes also leads the conference in steals at 4.4 a game. Overall, he is second in the nation at 3.3 a game.
This week’s AE Player of the Week is Quion Burns of those Black Bears. His 28 points vs the River Hawks was a career-high for him and 17 of those points came in the second half and OT. He also had eight rebounds. The AE Rookie of the Week is Martin Somerville of the River Hawks. This is the eighth award for him. He averaged 12.5 points and 4.5 assists in a 1-1 week for UMass Lowell. In the win over UNH on Saturday, Somerville had 18 points, all coming in 13 minutes of the second half.
There are a couple of interesting games this week in AE. On Thursday night, Bryant will be at UMBC. That game will be featured on ESPNU. Then on Saturday, Maine goes on the road and looks to stop a 28-game losing streak against Vermont.
Next week we will look ahead to the second half of league play.
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