The Berkeley College men's basketball team won its ninth consecutive victory on Sunday afternoon, rallying from a 12-point deficit to defeat the Panthers of Albany College of Pharmacy by a score of 79-71 in a Hudson Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Conference contest. The game took place at the Albert M. White Gymnasium in Albany, NY. With the win, the Knights are now 12-1 on the 2017-2018 campaign, and 3-0 in conference play. The Panthers dipped to 7-5 on the year, and 1-1 in league action. Following the game, Head Coach Jonathan Pena spoke about the resiliency of his group.
"We found ourselves trailing by double digits in the second half, but we knew we had enough time to put together a run, and we did a great job of chipping away and eventually completing the comeback," Pena said. "This was another encouraging team effort by our group, and I'm very proud of the hunger we showed today. We'll enjoy this one for a little while and then get ready for Vaughn College on Tuesday evening."
The Knights were paced in this win by Johnnie Green, as he tied for the game-high in points with 18 while connecting on eight of his 12 attempts from the floor. He also snatched a team-high 12 rebounds, including four on the offensive glass. Michael Taylor also notched 19 points while tallying game-highs of five assists and four steals, and Ricardo Ayuso added 11 points, seven rebounds, four assists, and four steals.
Despite the loss for the Panthers, Alex Johnson and Kyle Matousek tied for the team-lead with 18 points apiece. Johnson also grabbed a game-high 13 rebounds while registering a pair of assists, and Matousek added seven rebounds of his own. John Ambert finalized his afternoon by connecting on six of his nine attempts from the charity stripe and finishing with 14 points.
Berkeley College trailed 37-35 at the half – and the Knights found themselves down 68-56 with 6:17 remaining in regulation. That is when the momentum of the league battle would change, as Berkeley would start its sensational comeback. Ayuso's tip-in off a missed shot by Green started the Knight's rally. That was followed up by a converted three-point basket by Taylor. A Shamoree Strawn hoop, another basket by Taylor, and a successful layup by Green brought Berkeley to within one point – 68-67 – with 4:12 remaining.
Later – with 2:23 remaining and the Knights trailing 70-69 – Berkeley's Jerell McLeod would make a layup to give his team a 71-70 lead. After the Panthers' Ambert would split a pair of free throws to tie the game at 71 apiece, the Knights would take the lead for good when Strawn would connect on a jumper with 1:52 remaining to give Berkeley a 73-71 edge. The Knights would not allow any more points from that point on, out-scoring Albany College of Pharmacy 6-0 the rest of the way to account for the eight-point triumph.
The Knights won the game despite struggling with its shot, as the Knights hit on just 27 of their 74 attempts from the floor. Contrarily, the Panthers hit on 41.2 percent of their attempts (21-51). Berkeley dominated on the glass, out-rebounding Albany College of Pharmacy 56-37, ans the Knights also tallied 18 assists compared to 14 by the opposition. Berkeley scored 34 points in the paint while the Panthers netted 22 there, and Albany College of Pharmacy hit on 69 percent of its free throw attempts (20-29), while Berkeley misfired on a staggering 18 free throws (18-36, 50 percent conversion rate).
Berkeley will return to action on Tuesday evening, as the Knights will look to win their tenth consecutive game and stay perfect in conference play when they take on the Warriors of Vaughn College. The game will take place at Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park, NY. Start-time for the game is scheduled for 8:00pm.
