March 7, 2009

Final Stats

ALBANY, N.Y. - A 2009 all-conference first team honoree, Corey Lowe led the Boston University men's basketball team with 33 points, but fellow member Darryl Proctor recorded 33 of his own, as UMBC pulled out a 79-75 overtime victory in the quarterfinals of the America East tournament Saturday afternoon at SEFCU Arena. Eliminated from postseason play, the No. 3 seed Terriers fall to 17-13, while the defending champion Retrievers improve to 14-16.

BU led 66-58 with 3:13 left in regulation after Lowe's jumper, but the Terriers only scored one point the rest of the half, as Darryl Proctor's fadeaway jumper near the charity stripe with 2.5 seconds left on the clock sent the game to the second overtime, 67-67, in three games this season between the two squads.

In a program-record sixth overtime game for BU, Holland nailed a 3-pointer to tie the score, 73-73, during the extra session, but the Retrievers took a 77-74 lead off Proctor's layup with 29 seconds remaining. Lowe attempted a trey to even the contest with 10 seconds remaining but missed, and Jay Greene hit both of his free throws to seal the game.

UMBC's record improves to 6-11 against BU, as the Retrievers avoid the three-game sweep this season. The Terriers won the first meeting, 80-77, in double overtime at Case Gymnasium and was in a close contest with UMBC on the road before running away in the final minutes with a 82-65 victory.

Besides scoring more than 30 points for the third time this season, Lowe also had seven rebounds with four assists. John Holland finished with 20 points after only having three in the first half. In his final game, Matt Wolff had a strong performance with five points, a team-high nine rebounds and six assists, but for the first time this season, none of the three men stole the ball, as the Retrievers committed just four turnovers the entire game.

Holland finishes the season with 543 points, the ninth-most recorded in a season by a Terrier and the third most recorded under 15th-year head coach Dennis Wolff behind Tunji Awojobi ('93-'97). The career leading scorer had 658 in '96 and 615 in '95.

UMBC lost the rebound battle, 44-37, but grabbed the ball when it counted, scoring 18 second-chance points against BU's 12. The Retrievers also scored 18 points off turnovers and dominated in the paint with a 40-18 point edge.

Proctor had a double-double with 33 points and 11 rebounds, while Justin Fry recorded one of his own with 19 points and 10 boards. Second-team all-conference honoree Jay Greene had eight assists and eight rebounds, but BU's defense held him scoreless until he hit the two free throws in overtime. Chauncey Gilliam was the other Retriever in double-figures with 16 points.

Wolff's layup at 10:29 gave BU its largest lead of the first half, 22-13, but the Retrievers eventually tied the game, 24-24, at 4:29 off Fry's layup. Matt Spadafora's free throw gave UMBC a 29-26 lead with 2:01 remaining, but the Terriers scored the last five points off Scott Brittain's made free throws and Lowe's 3-pointer to take a 31-29 lead into halftime.

During the second half, the Terriers' lead continually went up and down. Jake O'Brien's 3-pointer gave BU a 42-35 edge at 15:13, but Fry's two free throws cut the deficit to one, 42-41, two minutes later.

Holland's back-to-back 3-pointers put BU up ahead 53-42, at the 9:52 mark, but again UMBC's seniors Proctor and Greene would not let the Retrievers fall apart as they chipped away again at the lead. Fry's free throws cut the deficit to four, 59-55, before Lowe put the Terriers up again by eight with 3:13 left in regulation. Holland's 3-pointer in the overtime proved to be BU's only field goal in the final 8:13 minutes of the game.

The Terriers finished the contest 26-of-60 at 43.3 percent and were also 12-of-32 from beyond the arc at 37.5 percent. UMBC finished 29-of-69 at 42 percent and was only 2-of-14 in 3-point land. The Retrievers made up for the poor 3-point shooting by going to the line, hitting 19-of-25 attempts at 76 percent, as the Terriers' foul troubles haunted them with both O'Brien and Brittain fouling out in the final minutes of regulation.

Despite the disappointing end to the 100th season, the Terriers finished with their first winning season since 2005 and return a strong core of players including two all-conference first team members in Lowe and Holland along with 2009 AE Rookie of the Year O'Brien.

Also, BU was without the services of 2007 AE Rookie of the Year Tyler Morris and sixth-man Carlos Strong during the conference schedule and will hope to have both men back healthy and ready to contribute next season.

Holland, Lowe and O'Brien will probably be the most anxious to have them back, as all three men cracked the top 10 in the BU record book for minutes played in a season. Holland finished with 1,065, the third most ever and just three minutes behind LeVar Folk ('97). Lowe had 1,060, while O'Brien set the freshman record with 1,043. Wolff came in a distant fourth this season with 1,018.