Oswego State men’s basketball has a meaningful weekend ahead of them. They will celebrate their seniors, recognize their alumni and fight for a potential home playoff game against The College at Brockport and SUNY Geneseo.
The Lakers sit two games behind SUNY Geneseo for the No. 4 seed in the SUNYAC playoffs. They will likely face off as the No. 4 and 5 seeds for the first round on Tuesday night, but this weekend’s games will determine the home team.
The Lakers tonight will host the Golden Eagles first and will need help from SUNY Cortland to still have a chance to host a playoff game. If the Lakers win and Cortland wins, Saturday’s game against SUNY Geneseo will decide who will host SUNYAC First Round.
“I think we’re into playoff mode already,” head coach Jason Leone said. “It’s not really implacable to talk about the game Saturday, because we need to win both games.”
Oswego State on the road outplayed Brockport for most of the game and were stout on defense.
“We did a really good job with our pick-and-roll coverage, that was a good,” Leone said. “We got to play defense without fouling. This time we got to play better without using our hands.”
The Golden Eagles struggled shooting in the first half of that game and trailed 40-28 in the second half. The Lakers stretched their lead to as much as 15 points, but the Golden Eagles found a spark and stormed back.
Closing out games have been a struggle at times this season. Brockport closed out the game outscoring Oswego State 22-8 the last 7:30 to defeat the Lakers 74-70. Although, the Lakers current 3-game win streak has featured competitive second half basketball that they came up on top of.
“Our strategy is always good [closing out games],” Leone said. “The guys know what we’re supposed to do. We really improved this year. So, I think we’re playing as well as we can right now.”
Ian Schupp and Jamir Ferebee caught fire last weekend. Ferebee scored 20 points in their win against Buffalo State and Schupp scored 25 points in their tight victory over SUNY Fredonia. Schupp has struggled shooting the ball at times this season and Ferebee was battling the flu the week prior.
“I think they’ve played well all year. I really do,” Leone said.
Despite the Lakers playing well for the most part against Brockport last time out, Schupp and Ferebee only combined for eight points. Expect those two to level their play in their last weekend suiting up at the Max Ziel Gymnasium.
Brockport’s top scorers from the first meeting Hamed Shamseldin and Justin Summers combined for 33 points and 6-23 from the field. They will be focal points of the Laker defense once again and the Lakers key to separating themselves throughout the game.
Both teams are fighting for playoff position, but I expect the Lakers to play with more of an edge as the hosts.
Lakers take this one, 70-65.
