Beavers Take Down College of Mount Saint Vincent

For just the second time this season, the CCNY Men’s Basketball team won back-to-back games, taking down the College of Mt. St. Vincent 91-76 at home.

By Jeff Weisinger 

In the last 72 hours, the CCNY Men’s Basketball team went from staring eye-to-eye with the lowest point of the season to making a complete-180 degree turn to possibly turning the corner for a strong finish going into the home stretch of the regular season.CCNY fought hard to take down The College of Mount Saint Vincent Monday 91-76 Monday night to improve to 6-8 overall in the regular season.  The win marks just the second time this season that CCNY has won back-to-back games, the last time coming back in late November when City beat St. Joseph’s-Long Island and Yeshiva University.“We just had to play hard for 40 minutes,” CCNY head coach Tom Green said about his team’s effort Monday night.]“It’s great because we feel good about ourselves and our guys are being rewarded for a very good effort.“It’s a very solid win for us.”The Beavers offense woke up for the first time since last year (literally), shooting 45 percent from the court and making 11 three-pointers on the night, six of which from David Solano, who scored 18 points on the night.“It’s just getting into a rhythm,” he said.  “It’s just a matter of getting the rhythm down, staying calm, relaxed and shooting smoothly.”Solano was one of three Beavers scoring in double digits on the night.  Both Khalil Hamer and Anthony Lewis scored in double digits once again with Hamer scoring 20 and Lewis scoring a game-high 34.Lewis’ 34-point night is just one point shy of his career-high 35 he scored against Brooklyn College back on Jan. 17, 2014.“We know what we got to do to win these games,” Lewis mentioned.  “This win is more than big.  We worked hard as a team.  This win is like the key to success.”The big win for City didn’t start anything close to perfect.  In fact, the first five minutes for City looked more like the key to failure than success.CCNY started in a 12-4 hole before Green called a timeout to get his team together.  They rallied from the timeout to a 23-9 run, taking a six-point, 27-21 lead with 6:15 left.Despite the solid run by City, CMSV still found a way to respond, scoring eight points in the final 1:23 of the half on two three-pointers by Antonio Johnson and a layup by James Zuccaro to tie the game going into the locker rooms.In the second half, after both teams missed on their opening possessions, City came out of fire, nailing three straight three-pointers, two from Solano and one from Manfred Cadet to start the second half shootout.  Trailing 45-44, Lewis’ layup put City up 46-45 with 16:21 left and the Beavers hung onto the lead from there.Despite a rally midway through the second that saw the Dolphins pull back within two, 61-59, the Beavers responded with a 10-2 rally to seal the win.“The win is huge,” Hamer added.  “We played a really good team today.“When we’re clicking, we feel like we can compete with anybody.”