BUC MEN/WOMEN WIN TOURNEY OPENERS
Buccaneers fend off Tyler in conference tournament opener
MEN
TYLER, Texas – Plagued by close losses all season, the Blinn men’s basketball team found a way to win when it mattered most.
The Buccaneers defeated Tyler Junior College 77-74 here at the Wagstaff Gym on Wednesday in their Region XIV Conference Tournament opener.
“I thought our guys were really focused and zeroed in on our game plan,” Blinn (18-13) coach Scott Schumacher said. “We really executed today and made enough plays down the stretch to win the game.”
Freshman point guard Jalan McCloud got a steal with 1.4 seconds to play that all but sealed the victory for the Bucs. Tyler fired off a prayer 3-pointer with less than a second remaining that bounced off the rim.
It was an intense final three minutes for Blinn before McCloud’s steal.
McCloud, who scored 11 points and had two steals, helped the Bucs build a 74-69 lead with two minutes to play. Tyler, though, forced a Blinn turnover that cut that lead to two, and the Apaches tied the game at 74 with a minute to play off a Blinn offensive foul.
That’s all the cushion the Bucs needed as they head to the tournament quarterfinals against No. 1 seed Paris at 1 p.m. Thursday.
Wednesday’s win was a refreshing change of pace for Schumacher and the Bucs. Of their 13 losses on the season, nine have come by six points or fewer.
Brooks scored a team-high 15 points, while Cornell Barnett added 14 and Eddie Alcantara dropped 13 off the bench, including a pair of 3-pointers in the final minute of the first half to give Blinn a 37-33 halftime lead.
“Eddie hit some big shots for us today,” Schumacher said. “Cornell gave us that big presence we needed in the paint.”
After hitting four 3-pointers in the opening minutes of the game, Tyler missed its final 14 shots behind the arc, including two in the final minute that would have given the Apaches the lead.
Blinn held on to its late lead going 8-for-12 from the free throw line in the final minutes.
The Bucs turn their focus to a Paris squad that handed them an 87-76 loss in November. Paris rallied for 50 second-half points after trailing 40-37 at halftime. It was Paris 3-pointers that killed the Bucs that game—the Dragons shot 33 percent from the 3-point line to Blinn’s 6 percent.
“They’re a very well coached team with a lot of good athletes,” Schumacher said. “I expect it to be another grind-it-out game.”
For more information on Blinn men’s basketball, including broadcast links to Thursday’s game, visit www.buccaneersports.com.
Buccaneers advance to semis with 84-69 win
WOMEN
TYLER, Texas – For the third time this season, the Angelina Lady Roadrunners put a scare in the Blinn women’s basketball team. But like the previous two contests, the 12th-ranked Buccaneers found a way to win.
Blinn defeated Angelina 84-69 in its Region XIV Conference Tournament opener here at the University of Texas at Tyler on Wednesday.
“We survived and now we advance,” Blinn (26-5) coach Jeff Jenkins said. “We didn’t play our best and I thought Angelina played well, but we did what we had to do and got the win.”
Next up for the Bucs, 11th-ranked Tyler Junior College at 3 p.m. Friday. The winner of that game advances to the tournament finals and earns a berth to the NJCAA Division I Women’s Basketball National Championship.
The Bucs had to overcome a second-half run by Angelina to advance when the ball clearly wasn’t bouncing their way.
The Lady Roadrunners took control of the offensive glass and cut Blinn’s lead to six points, 63-54 with 5:33 to play, off second- and third-chance opportunities.
“We were getting killed on the boards,” Jenkins said. “We don’t have enough size in the post, so we had to rebound as a team.”
Having 6-foot forward Shunta Nevitt, one of the team’s better rebounders who was in foul trouble, didn’t help, either.
Angelina went with a full-court press late in the second half, which disrupted Blinn’s offense for a time, but the Bucs, behind the quickness of their guards, pushed through the press and fed the ball to their end of the court for easy buckets.
Blinn went on a 10-2 run that spanned nearly three minutes late in the second half.
With two minutes to play, the Bucs had seized control of the game once more.
Sophomore Fatima Adams scored 23 points, including a 12-for-16 showing from the free throw line, and pulled down 12 rebounds. Katrina Hayden scored 18 points, Nevitt scored 12 and Amari Jones and Alexus Freeman scored 10.
“All those girls played hard tonight,” Jenkins said.
The Bucs split their head-to-head match-ups with Tyler during the regular season. Blinn won a shootout at the Blinn P.E. Building in January 106-102. The Lady Apaches took the latter contest 98-95 in Tyler.
“Tyler is a tough match-up for us,” Jenkins said. “We can both score a lot of points, the key for us is getting more stops on defense.”
For more information on Blinn women’s basketball, including broadcast links to Friday’s game, visit www.buccaneersports.com.
(Story & photos courtesy: Matt Keyser, Blinn Information)