Danes fade late, settle for split at Vermont
Trip deemed success vs. conference favorites
Baseball managers often say doubleheaders are easy to lose but hard to win, which may not make a lot of sense, but a split of two weekend games in Vermont seemed to leave the University at Albany basketball team satisfied.
A night after pulling off an improbable upset, Ualbany struggled in the second half Sunday and lost to America East Conference preseason favorite Vermont 74-66 in a spectator-less Patrick Gymnasium in Burlington.
Allowing no fans is one way the America East is combating the spread of COVID -19. Another is to have its teams play weekend doubleheaders at the same site. Going into the weekend, six of the eight weekend series resulted in sweeps, but three of the four conference matchups Saturday and Sunday were split.
“To come up here and get a split without two starters and not knowing if we were going to have (guard Jamel) Horton, it was a good weekend,” Ualbany coach Will Brown said after his team fell to 1-4 overall and 1-3 in conference.
Junior guard Cameron Healy (oblique) and junior forward Adam Lulka (head) made the trip but neither dressed. Horton, who had been questionable after injuring his back last week in practice, wound
up playing 56 minutes in two games, including Saturday night’s 63-62 Great Danes victory.
Vermont (3-3, 3-3), which has split all three of its America East series, scored the first eight points of the second half to break a 39-39 tie and avoid getting swept by a team it had defeated nine straight times before Saturday night.
“This was a nice bounce-back win,” Catamounts coach John Becker said. “Obviously, yesterday was a tough loss, but our defense in the second half was more up to par.”
The Danes were on top for more than 10 minutes in the first half and led by as many as seven, a bigger margin than at any point in Saturday’s game. Sparked by Antonio Rizzuto and C.J. Kelly with 14 points each, Ualbany shot 52 percent in the half, including 8-for-15 from 3-point territory.
Vermont never trailed in the second half, although Ualbany closed what at one time was a 10-point deficit to two. The combination of Lulka’s absence and foul trouble by 6-9 senior Jarvis Doles exposed the Danes inside.
The Catamounts outrebounded the Danes 24-14 in the second half. Vermont junior Ryan Davis had 13 of his 19 points after halftime.
“Not having Lulka hurts us right now,” Brown said. “We’re asking both Doles and (senior Kellon) Taylor to do an awful lot. When Doles goes out, we list Taylor at 6-6, so what that means he’s maybe 6-5 and he’s strong, but Davis is a good 250 (pounds), he’s 6-foot-8 and he’s a really good player.”
Rizzuto matched a career high with 21 points but Kelly was scoreless in the second half, missing four shots and fouling out with 43.5 seconds to play.
Brown continues to employ his bench, using 10 players — seven for 16 minutes or more — as he tries to make up for a shortened preseason schedule and lack of nonconference games.
“We have a lot new guys that are playing, and we have a lot of guys that are hurt right now,” Rizzuto said. “We’re trying to figure out what our team is like through this. We’re just trying to figure out how to win games, and we’ll be OK.
“We came back from 18 points, and those new guys stepped up big. It hurts not having Cam and Adam, but those (new) guys stepped up and we figured out how to beat a good team. Today, we did some things wrong and weren’t making some shots down the stretch.”