A long night on the local hoops scene. Villanova got a much-needed win at Connecticut to assure itself of at least a .500 finish in the conference. It will be beaten to death over the course of tomorrow's news cycle, but Scottie Reynolds deserves all the praise he's going to get for a record-setting night:
Name |
Min |
FG |
3pt |
FT |
OR |
TR |
A |
TO |
S |
Blk |
PF |
Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
S. Reynolds |
36 |
12-25 |
6-15 |
10-14 |
0 |
4 |
3 |
4 |
2 |
0 |
5 |
40 |
That's a new freshman record at Villanova, and the most points ever scored by an opposing player at Gampel Pavilion. Oh, and it's more than half of the Wildcats' points total on the night, which would be 78 to UConn's 74.
The news was not so good for La Salle, which is to say it wasn't good at all. The Explorers were eliminated from contention for that last A-10 Tournament spot with a bruising 102-63 loss at UMass. It shouldn't surprise anyone to hear that Minuteman Stephane Lasme had a big night, but a triple-double is always worth highlighting. Especially when one-third of that comes from blocked shots:
Name |
Min |
FG |
3pt |
FT |
OR |
TR |
A |
TO |
S |
Blk |
PF |
Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
S. Lasme |
32 |
5-9 |
0-0 |
7-10 |
4 |
10 |
2 |
0 |
1 |
10 |
0 |
17 |
The biggest stat of the game, though, was rebounds: UMass pulled down 50 of them to La Salle's 24. The Minutemen had 14 offensive rebounds and the Explorers had 15 defensive rebounds.
Uh, yeah.
And I'll give you one national Line of the Day. It has a Philly-area connection because Maryland coach Gary Williams is a South Jersey native, and has every bit of that fight and passion and emotion in him that you'd expect from someone whose accent is as thick as what you hear at the Italian Market.
Williams has a 6-5 freshman guard from Venezuela, Greivis Vasquez, who's a livewire unlike perhaps any other freshman at that position in the game this season. Vasquez is full of energy and just flies around all over the place with the ball, and sometimes without it, and from what I've heard he's just as energetic off the court as he is on it.
The Terrapins beat Duke at Cameron tonight, the third time in the last five years they've done so. Here's what Vasquez did to the Blue Devils:
Name |
Min |
FG |
3pt |
FT |
OR |
TR |
A |
TO |
S |
Blk |
PF |
Pts |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
G. Vasquez |
35 |
5-8 |
2-5 |
1-2 |
1 |
9 |
12 |
4 |
1 |
1 |
3 |
13 |
I've been telling people all season not to sleep on Villanova come March, which lo and behold has arrived while I type this post. It's been quite a few years since Maryland played with this kind of consistency (and they did lose at home to Miami this season), but I'm starting to think that the Terrapins could do some damage in this year's Tournament.
