Christopher Newport men cruise into 2nd round

Graduate student Jake Latta scored a career-high 22 points Friday as defending champion Christopher Newport defeated Hobart 79-59 in the NCAA Division III Men’s Tournament’s first round near Philadelphia.

CNU (22-6), ranked 25th nationally by d3hoops.com, never trailed as it advanced to a 7:40 p.m. round-of-32 game today against the winner of Friday’s game between No. 13 Widener, the host of the pod in Chester, Pennsylvania, and Roger Williams.

Latta was 7 of 9 from the floor and 7 of 9 on free throws, and he grabbed seven rebounds.

Toa Hollenbeck, a Grassfield High graduate who was the CoastTo-Coast Athletic Conference

Rookie of the Year, added 17 points, and fellow freshman Isaiah Dozier had 12 points. Norview High product Jahn Hines added eight points, nine rebounds and four assists.

The Captains, making their eighth consecutive NCAA appearance, went ahead 11-2. The Statesmen (22-6) of Geneva, New York, pulled to 27-26 before CNU went on a 10-0 run — including the last six points of the first half — for a 37-26 lead.

A Latta dunk with 15:05 remaining made it 42-31, and the Captains kept the lead in double digits thereafter. Aidan Rodgers led Hobart with 14 points.

Swarthmore 67, Virginia Wesleyan 59:

The Marlins (19-9), playing their first NCAA Tournament game since 2015, fell to a Garnet team (21-8) from Pennsylvania

that extended its winning streak to 10 games.

Playing in the arena of fourthranked Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, VWU went scoreless until Paul Anderson’s layup with 13:34 on the clock cut Swarthmore’s lead to 7-2. The Marlins stayed cold and fell behind 23-4 with 8:17 remaining, and the Garnet’s lead twice grew to 23 points. It was 37-19 at halftime.

The Marlins stormed back, twice cutting their deficit to five, both times when Amarion Wilson scored. It was 59-54 with 3:30 to go, but VWU again hit a drought and yielded a virtually decisive 5-0 run.

Waylo Wilson had 14 points, Miles Wallace 11 and Amari Moorer 10 for VWU. But the Marlins hit just 25 of 68 (36.8%) from the field, including 3 of 17 from 3-point range.

Michael Caprise had 20 points and 14 rebounds for Swarthmore, while Vinny DeAngelo had 17 points and eight assists.

Women Johns Hopkins 75, Marietta 66:

The Bluejays (25-3), from Baltimore, won against an Ohio team at Christopher Newport’s Freeman Center to advance to tonight’s round-of-32 game.

Macie Feldman had 18 points, eight rebounds, five assists and three steals for the Bluejays.

Johns Hopkins will face the winner of Friday night’s late game between No. 4 CNU and Mount Saint Vincent of New York. Marietta finished 21-7.