The No. 11 Marist Red Foxes (7-24, 6-15 MAAC) brought their band from home in Poughkeepsie, New York, all the way to Albany. The men’s basketball team also brought their best effort of the season, and it helped them to bring home an 80-74 win.
The Red Foxes are the lowest seed in the 2015 men’s basketball MAAC Championship. But in their first round matchup against the No. 6 Quinnipiac Bobcats (15-15, 9-12 MAAC), they played with the confidence of a top seeded team.
Senior Chavaughn Lewis entered last night’s game against the Bobcats just seven points shy of becoming Marists’ all-time leader in scoring. Lewis jumped to the top of Marists’ record books early in the first half, and it gave his younger teammates the energy they needed to fight.
“Breaking [the scoring record] in a game like this where we were so highly competitive against a great team, and actually getting a win on top of that, it was just an honor,” Lewis said. “I’m really excited and happy that my teammates came through for the seniors and actually pulled away for a win.”
Marist sank their first four three-point shots, and made nine of 12 in the first half. The three-point shooting is what put the Bobcats in an early hole, and it’s what held them down for the last 38 minutes of the game. Two of the younger players that stepped up for the Red Foxes were Philip Lawrence and Khallid Hart, who combined for five threes and 21 points in the first half.
On the other end, senior Ousmane Drame was unstoppable. The 6-foot-9 senior recorded 14 points and 10 boards in the first half for his NCAA leading twentieth double-double of the season. But unlike Lewis for Marist, Drame’s success was not contagious within his team.
The rest of the Bobcats shot a combined 4-19 from the field and 3-7 from the line, and found themselves down 41-27 at the half.
Then the whistle blew for the start of the second half, and the Bobcats turned the game around. They were down 14 points with 15 minutes to play, but that’s when senior Zaid Hearst hit a deep three-point shot. After struggling in the first half, the field goal from Hearst was a welcome sight to head coach Tom Moore, and they ran with it.
Freshman Dimitri Floras forced three turnovers within the next minute, Drame threw down a dunk over a crowd of Marist defenders, and the lead was down to one with just under 11 minutes to play. The Bobcats could see the light at the end of the tunnel.
But Marist’s timely three-point shooting quickly extinguished the small light that Quinnipiac saw.
After Hearst successfully converted a four-point play to cut the lead to three late in the second half, Marist coach Mike Maker called a timeout. Hart hit a jumper out of the timeout to stall Quinnipiac’s momentum, and on Marist’s next possession T.J. Curry buried a dagger from 25 feet out.
“[Then] I just looked up at the scoreboard, and I was like, ‘this is ours,’” Hart said. “I’m glad we finished out the game and got the win, and [now] we’re advancing.”
Drame was the lone bright spot for Quinnipiac last night, but his 27 points and 23 rebounds could not prevent Marist’s shots from falling.
“I tried to do whatever I could do to help my team win,” Drame said. “And unfortunately I failed at that. At the end of the day, I helped them lose, more than I helped them win. That’s how I see it.”
Marist hit the shots it needed to down the stretch, and Quinnipiac did not. Despite shooting the lowest percentage from downtown in the MAAC this season, the Red Foxes finished the night 13-19 from three-point range, while the Bobcats shot 7-31 from the same distance.
“I knew what the goal was,” Drame said. “To win. To face Manhattan in the second round, or go home.”
The Red Foxes have not made it out of the first round of the MAAC Championship since 2012, but last night, they did enough to get by. They play No. 3 Manhattan tomorrow night at 8 p.m.
