Students, faculty, and parents gathered on February 19th to cheer on the Nittany Lions as they began their playoff run in the United East Division Tournament.
The Lions had to win the tournament to clinch an automatic bid into the NCAA DIII March Madness bracket. The Nittany Lions came into this tournament with a commanding 21-4 overall record on the season, leading the entire conference. This allowed them to host all games throughout this division tournament. Penn College came to town for their second time this season making this the third matchup between the teams. The other two matchups resulted in the Nittany Lions coming out on top by margins of 6 and 16 points. The Wildcats struggled during the season finishing with a 10-16 overall record, but this was no easy match for the Nittany Lions. As most college basketball fans know, anything can happen in the playoffs.
The game started off with high intensity and physicality as the Wildcats showed they were not going down without a fight. PSH senior Donyae Baylor-Carroll said his message to the team going into the game was to “come in focused, be serious and locked in and play forty minutes.”
It was a back-and-forth first half, ending with the score tied at 47. Baylor-Carroll led the Lions with 23 points at the break but he knew he needed to do much more if the Lions wanted to extend their stay in the Division Tournament.
PSH head coach Don Friday relayed his message to the team at halftime.
“[We needed] longer possessions on the offensive end, but we needed to get stops. They had four guys that had 20 minutes in the first half, and we needed to continue to keep pushing the tempo, force them to guard, and get good shots for our guys,” Coach Friday said.
The Lions opened the second half on a 10-0 run to extend their lead and give them some breathing room. Friday said that a key component to the run was “a lockdown defensive effort to better control the pace of the game.” The Lions’ defense in the second half helped ease the pressure on the offense as it allowed them to slow the game down and make the shots they had been practicing.
After allowing 47 points in the first half, the Lions held the Wildcats to only 32 points in the second, and this was the leading factor for their success in this matchup. It was a pitch perfect second half performance from the entire team. This helped them to close out the game with a final score of 92-79. Baylor-Carroll was the superstar of the game contributing with a season high 42 points, 8 rebounds, 6 assists, and 6 steals.
After the game, Baylor-Carroll explained his mindset and his thoughts on the winning effort.
“In a game like that, my biggest thing is to just win. My mindset was to keep going back at them, my teammates definitely gave me a lot of confidence, and we all just put in a team effort to get the job done,” he said.
Senior Nate Curry finished with a game high 9 rebounds along with 17 points.
It was a great win from the Lions that certainly carried over some confidence for them as they went on to win their second United East Division tournament in three years. The Lions next took on Saint Mary’s (MD) Seahawks in the next round of this tournament.
