The first semifinal match-up for SUNYAC men’s basketball took place Friday night in Oswego at the Max Ziel Gymnasium.
No. 3 SUNY Oneonta shocked the No. 2 seed the College at Brockport in a commanding 85-72 victory to advance to tomorrow’s SUNYAC title game.
SUNY Oneonta’s Lawrence Coleman finished with a double-double of 24 points and 16 rebounds, Kelly Frankie scored 21 points as well.
Devonn Gavin led the Golden Eagles in scoring with 20 points of his own.
The first half began with a lot of intensity for the two teams, the College at Brockport started off hot, but SUNY Oneonta did not strand too far behind.
Devonn Gavin for the Golden Eagles got it going early, he scored 12 of his points in the first half with two shots from beyond the arc.
Brockport got out to their largest lead of 31-22 with 8:24 in the first half. Oneonta then began to buckle down on both ends of the floor out of their timeout.
Lawrence Coleman started to find his groove offensively, he finished the first half with 13 points and 6 rebounds.
SUNY Oneonta got their first lead of the game with 2:30 remaining in the first half after a pair of free throws from Coleman. They held the Golden Eagles to five points the last eight minutes of the half to lead 38-36.
Halftime didn’t seem to cool down the Red Dragons, they forced the Golden Eagles into a quick timeout two and a half minutes into the second half by going up 44-38.
Both teams traded buckets for the next 10 minutes, but SUNY Oneonta eventually separated themselves and got their lead up to 72-58 with 4 minutes to go.
Mikey Mcelroy shook off his first half struggles with 12 second half points by getting to the free throw line, he nailed 10-12 from the charity stripe.
The Golden Eagles did everything they can to start up a comeback, but struggled with finding good shots and knocking them down.
SUNY Oneonta outshot the College at Brockport 53 percent to 34 percent from the field, including 30 percent to 16 percent from three point land.
The College at Brockport drops to 19-7 overall as they still seek to be in contention for a NCAA tournament bid.
No. 3 Oneonta will take on the winner of No. 1 Oswego State and No. 5 Buffalo State tomorrow at 4:00 p.m. at the Max Ziel Gymnasium in Oswego, New York.
