UVM men's basketball blasts Binghamton to surge into America East title game
On the eve of the America East Conference playoffs, University of Vermont men's basketball coach John Becker said the focus and intensity would go up a notch with his players. Execution would be sharper, too.
"You'll see a different Vermont team," Becker promised.
Two games in the books, the 12th-year Catamount bench boss has been proven right. And now Vermont stands one game shy of going back to the NCAA Tournament.
Behind Dylan Penn’s 20 of his game-high 26 points in the first half, the top-seeded Catamounts roared past No. 5 Binghamton for a 79-57 victory in the conference semifinals in front of 2,451 at Patrick Gym on Tuesday night.
The Catamounts (22-10) will play host to No. 2 UMass Lowell, a 75-64 semifinal winner of New Hampshire, in the America East championship on Saturday at 11 a.m. on ESPN2. Patrick Gym will be the site of the league title game for the fifth time since 2017.
"They’ve been waiting for this week all year," Becker said. "This week is all about these guys. We come up with the game plan, they believe what we tell them and they go out there and do it. It’s them."
Penn, not known for his outside shot, stroked four 3s during the game's decisive run in the first half and Kam Gibson supplied his dose of a shooter's offense to open the second stanza as Vermont rolled to its 14th straight victory and its second straight semifinal triumph over the Bearcats in as many as seasons.
Vermont is hunting back-to-back tournament crowns and will attempt to extend its league record to 10 overall titles. A win on Saturday would also give Vermont its ninth appearance in the NCAA Tournament.
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Although Vermont shot 60% from the floor, the team's defensive force from the opening tip set the tone. Becker laid that credit to his players, again.
"I didn’t have to say anything to be honest with you. That had nothing to do with me. That had to do with the guys in the locker room and the older guys in the locker room," Becker said. "This is their last chance and they played with the desperation of guys who didn’t want their NCAA hopes to end tonight."
Locked in a tight battle with less than 8 minutes to play in the first half, and leading only 16-12, Vermont turned to Penn and its bench to string together baskets. Penn uncorked all four of his triples during a 23-6 run to close the first half, pushing the Catamounts to a 39-18 advantage at the break.
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Penn is averaging 24.5 points a game in the America East tourney.
"When you have those nights, you just want to stay aggressive," Penn said. "They were giving me opportunities to step into clean looks. I hit one early and I felt good, felt like I was in rhythm. As long as I’m ready to shoot and they give me enough time and space, I’m confident enough to come in and knock them down."
The run included 11 unanswered points that featured Nick Fiorillo's transition bucket started with an Ileri Ayo-Faleye's diving, loose-ball steal and back-to-back Penn 3s from each corner for a 30-14 lead with 3:37 until the half.
"Early on I thought we were hanging in the game and I thought we guarded well and then Penn got loose and started making some 3s," Binghamton coach Levell Sanders said. "He hadn’t been shooting that great all season, but that’s what big-time players do, they step up when the lights are on and that’s what he did.
"It was really that first half that did us in."
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Gibson found a groove out of the intermission, tallying his team's first 11 points of the half with pull-up jumpers, a smooth runner and a 3-pointer to build a 50-24 lead with 16:24 left in regulation. Gibson finished with 15 points on 7 of 8 shooting.
"I was just feeling good. I felt like I started the half with a couple good looks and once those looks went in, it was take advantage of any other looks I get," Gibson said.
Aaron Deloney tallied 12 second-half points in a 13-point outing, while Robin Duncan posted eight rebounds and eight assists for the Cats, who won the rebounding edge (27-25) and outscored Binghamton 48-18 in the paint. The Catamounts also scored 15 points off 13 Binghamton miscues and committed just four turnovers of their own.
"I thought (UVM) played really well, defensively, offensively — they just kept coming at us," Sanders said.
The Bearcats were hampered by leading scorer Jacob Falko (19 points) battling foul trouble for much of the game. Falko picked up two fouls in the game's first six minutes and returned with 5:51 to go in the opening half. And Vermont exploited that to its advantage.
"That was part of the game plan from the beginning, to target him a little bit. Certainly when he got two fouls that was a huge deal," Becker said of Falko. "He ended up in almost every action and he was in a tough spot."
The Catamounts will play in their ninth America East final in coach Becker’s tenure. This appearance, though, appeared unlikely when Vermont started 2-7 during a brutal nonconference slate and endured a weary travel.
"That’s what the journey is about, that’s what coaching is about, that’s what a season is about," Becker said. "I’m going to look back when this is all over with a lot of pride."
Contact Alex Abrami at aabrami@freepressmedia.com. Follow him on Twitter: @aabrami5.
This article originally appeared on Burlington Free Press: Vermont men's basketball: Catamounts blast Binghamton in AE semifinals
