The Berkeley College men's basketball team recorded its seventh consecutive victory on Sunday afternoon, blowing out the Lynx of NHTI by a score of 85-61 on the second day of the NHTI Holiday Inn New Year's Classic. The game was played in Concord, New Hampshire. With the victory, the Knights are now 10-1 on the season, while the Lynx dipped to 12-3 with the defeat. Following the win, Head Coach Jonathan Pena gave his thoughts.
"I'm very proud of the results achieved by our team within the last 24 hours," Pena said. "We came here to New Hampshire with one goal in mind - and that was to play collective team basketball and come away with two wins - and we did just that. We'll enjoy these two victories as we get ready to head back to New York - and we'll get set to resume our HVIAC portion of the schedule on Thursday against Pratt Institute."
Berkeley College was paced by the stellar effort of Michael Taylor in its latest impressive triumph, as the senior scored a game-high 19 points while connecting on three triples and converting on all four of his attempts from the charity stripe. Ricardo Ayuso contributed with 13 points, three assists, two rebounds, and two steals, and Nigel Hemingway added 10 points, six rebounds, and four assists.
Despite the loss for NHTI, J'Quavious Thurman scored a game-high 17 points while connecting on six of his 11 attempts from the floor. He also snatched six rebounds and added two steals. Javan Parkinson dropped-in 10 points, and Joe Simpson helped out with eight points, seven rebounds, and four assists.
Berkeley College trailed just briefly in this game, as NHTI held an 8-6 lead 3:47 into the game. Taylor's three-point basket 5:00 into the opening session gave the Knights an 11-8 advantage, and that would give Berkeley College the lead for good. The Lynx stayed within striking distance for a majority of the first half, as the Knights held just a 33-25 edge with 4:23 remaining in the session. Berkeley would finish the period on a 14-5 run, however, to take a 47-30 lead into the locker room.
The Knights held a 20-point lead - 52-32 - with 18:26 remaining in the game, but the Lynx refused to go away, battling back and eventually pulling to within nine points - 57-48 - with 12:13 to go. The Knights would buckle down from there, though, allowing just three Lynx field goals the rest of the way before running away with a 24-point victory.
Berkeley shot 37.2 percent from the floor for the afternoon (29-78) compared to 27.9 percent for NHTI (17-61). Both teams struggled mightily from the free throw line, which the Lynx misfiring on 20 attempts from the line (23-43, 53.5 percent), and the Knights missing 10 freebees (19-29, 65.5 percent). Berkeley dominated on the glass, out-rebounding NHTI 60-41, and the Knights recorded 16 assists to the opposition's nine.
The Knights will return to action on Thursday evening, as Berkeley College will take on Pratt Institute in a Hudson Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Conference contest. The game will take place at the Borough of Manhattan Community College. Start-time is scheduled for 8:00pm.
