LANCASTER, Pa. – The trio of Andrews
Powers, Corey Dorsey and Dan
Capkin combined for 59 points, leading Gettysburg to a
79-58 victory over McDaniel in the Centennial Conference (CC)
men's basketball semifinals at Franklin & Marshall on
Saturday.
The Bullets (17-8) got a game-high 21 points from Powers, the CC
Player of the Year, while Dorsey and Capkin contributed 19 points
apiece to earn the team a spot in the conference championship game
for the second consecutive year and fourth time since becoming the
first team to win back-to-back titles in 2001 and
2002.
Four players reached double figures for the Green Terror (18-8),
who fell for the third time in its last four games and dropped to
0-3 all-time in the CC playoffs. T.J. Odunlami (Columbia,
Md./Atholton) led the way with 11 points while
Chad Arrington (Randallstown,
Md./Randallstown), Louis Sarris-Grau (Huntingdon
Valley, Pa./Lower Moreland) and Marcus Dyson
(Scotch Plains, N.J./Union Catholic) added 10 points
apiece.
Gettysburg will face the winner of the day's second semifinal
between Franklin & Marshall and Muhlenberg on Sunday at 3 p.m.
with the conference championship and automatic bid to the NCAA
Division III tournament on the line.
Baskets from Sarris-Grau and Arrington allowed McDaniel to jump out
to a 4-2 lead just 2:06 into the game but the Bullets got a basket
from Dorsey to knot the game before Powers hit the second of two
free throws with 16:47 on the clock to give his team the lead for
good.
A Ryan Finch (Flemington, N.J./Hunterdon) layup
made it an 8-6 game with 14 minutes to play but five straight
Gettysburg points pushed the advantage to 13-6 with 12:34
showing.
A Sarris-Grau jumper pulled the Green Terror within 13-10 but the
Bullets outscored McDaniel 23-9 over the final 10:30 of the first
half. Dorsey capped the explosion with a half-court shot that just
beat the halftime buzzer to match the team's largest lead of
the stanza.
Gettysburg continued its run into the second half, stretching the
advantage to 30 before the period was halfway done.
A Capkin jumper with 9:23 to play gave the Bullets their largest
lead of the game at 61-29 and the Green Terror got no closer than
18 the rest of the way – when Dyson hit a layup with 32
seconds remaining.
In a season in which McDaniel tallied a program-record 18 wins, the
21 points was the largest margin of defeat for the Green Terror all
season. Only once previous had the squad lost by more than 10
– a 74-57 loss at Washington (Md.) on Feb. 14.
The team with the nation's best 3-point field-goal defense
allowed Gettysburg to shoot 60 percent (9 of 15) from behind the
arc.
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