Comeback bids come up short for WCU

WEST CHESTER » A week earlier, the West Chester men’s basketball team fought with every ounce of its fiber in order to edge Shippensburg in the regular season finale and earn home court advantage for a potential rematch in the PSAC Tournament Quarterfinals.

But the visiting Raiders topped the Golden Rams anyway on Wednesday at Hollinger Field House, 87-79, to knock 24th ranked WCU out of the tourney. Now 21-6 overall, West Chester will now wait to see if it slips into the NCAA Division II Tournament when the field is announced on Sunday.

“We will definitely be sweating it out,” said head coach Damien Blair. “We’re third right now (in the NCAA Atlantic Region rankings), so you wouldn’t think we would drop more than five spots. If we’d have won this game, we were guaranteed to get in.”

In the third meeting of the season following a regular season split, however, Shippensburg (23-6 overall) led the entire second half, and held off several furious WCU rallies to hold on and advance to the PSAC Semifinals at East Stroudsburg.

“We just didn’t play well enough, certainly not one of our better games,” Blair said. “And when you are playing one of the best teams in the best league in the country, you have to play well to win, and we didn’t.

“The officials tried their best to call an even game, but a lot of the calls just didn’t go our way.”

It was a highly emotional and physical battle, but unlike a week ago, the Rams were unable to replicate perhaps the season’s best defensive performance. In order to earn an at-large bid to the NCAA’s, and see its season continue, West Chester needs to finish among the top eight.

“We just have to wait and see,” said senior Tyrell Long, who played for the final time at Hollinger. “I am just praying to God to give me one more chance to put this uniform on one more time.”

The Rams started the 2017-18 campaign with 12 consecutive wins and 15 of the first 16. But on Wednesday, a shaky finish to the first half was their undoing, along with some inaccurate shooting from beyond the arc (4 of 23). For the evening, WCU connected on just 37 percent of its shots from the field, while the Raiders shot nearly 10-percentage points better.

“We have to give credit where credit is due. (Shippensburg) played harder and wanted it more than us for a larger part of the game,” Long acknowledged.

“We probably played a Bminus game and (Shippensburg) played an A,” Blair added. “It’s frustrating, but the kids played hard all season long.”

The Rams exited the locker room for the second half with renewed energy and immediately cut an eight point deficit to three. But by the midway point of the half, the Raiders had amassed a 14-point cushion, 58-44.

West Chester staged no less than three more runs the rest of the way, and actually pulled to within four at 73-69 with 2:39 remaining after a steal by Matt Penecale and a jumper by Jackson Hyland. But the Raiders outscored the Rams 14-10 the rest of the way.

“The first half we were hesitant,” Long said. “In the second, we were hungrier, but it was too late. We made runs, but if you don’t get defensive stops, the runs don’t really mean anything.”

The Raiders reeled off an 18-6 run in the last sixplus minutes of the first half to take a 37-29 lead at the break. The Rams shot a paltry 31 percent from the floor and was much worse (1-for9) from 3-point range.

“We had three of our five starters in foul trouble,” said Long, who led the way with 23 points.

Hyland scored 18 of his 22 in the second half, and Frank Rokins chipped in 11 points despite foul trouble. Evan-Eric Longino added 13 points of the bench, but the rest of WCU’s reserved combined to shoot 0-for-11.

Shippensburg’s Dustin Sleva led all scorers with 24 and Antonio Kellem buried four 3-pointers and added 21.

“I’m hopeful we get (into the NCAA’s), but there are no guarantees,” Blair warned. “And we don’t have any control anymore.

“We just have to keep our fingers crossed and hope out body of work throughout the season is enough to get an atlarge bid.”