University of Richmond
OLD DOMINION
Men's Basketball Downs Old Dominon, 61-58
12/20/2005 | Men's Basketball
Dec. 20, 2005
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UNIVERSITY OF RICHMOND, Va. - The University of Richmond men's basketball team raced out to leads of 17-0 and 21-2, weathered a second-half drought and then erupted for 15 points in overtime to take a 61-58 victory over Old Dominion on Tuesday night in the Robins Center.
"We stayed with our staples, our defense never let up," first-year Richmond head coach Chris Mooney said. "We continued to kind of plug away and plug away. As frustrated as I am or they are on the court, you still have to go to what you do and what you practice. I thought we did that and finally things started to break for us and we played very well in overtime."
The Spiders (5-4), who lead the nation in scoring defense, held an Old Dominion (7-3) team coming off scoring 87 points against DePaul to just two points over the first 11 minutes of the game. Richmond led 30-17 at the half, but struggled to score in the second half with just 16 points in the second session.
Then in overtime Richmond fell behind by four points early, but outscored Old Dominion 15-8 the rest of the way. Senior Kevin Steenberge scored eight of his 14 points in the final 1:23 of overtime, with two old-fashioned three-point plays and a dunk to lead the Spiders to victory.
"That's a great win because that's a terrific team," Mooney said of the Monarchs, who are looking for their second-straight NCAA appearance. "That's a team that's going to win over 20 games and be in postseason play. I have a tremendous amount of respect for Old Dominion and I feel very fortunate that we were able to beat them."
Richmond trailed 54-53 with under two minutes to play, but Steenberge took a pass from junior Gaston Moliva, scored on a lay-up and was fouled, making the free throw to give the Spiders a two-point lead.
Old Dominion star Alex Loughton, who scored a game-high 22 points, tied the game with a lay-up with 1:02 left, but Richmond's offense got senior Jermaine Bucknor the ball at the top of the key and what happened next couldn't have been drawn up any better. Bucknor, who had hit five 3-pointers on the night, couldn't get a shot off, but he found sophomore Oumar Sylla just below the foul line. Sylla had cut there and was wide open, so he drew a defender from the baseline, leaving Steenberge wide open for a monster dunk and a 58-56 lead with 33 seconds left.
"They left Oumar in the paint down low, I hit Oumar and Kevin's man had no choice but to leave Kevin," Bucknor said. "Oumar made a spectacular pass to Kevin and you know how Kevin finishes."
After Old Dominion's Isaiah Hunter missed a jumper to tie, Richmond junior Gaston Moliva came up with the rebound and called timeout before going out-of-bounds. On the ensuing in-bound play with six seconds left, junior Peter Thomas hit Steenberge going deep for a fast-break lay-up and the foul, icing the game.
Senior Jermaine Bucknor tied a season-high with 19 points, including a clutch 3-pointer with 3:06 remaining that gave Richmond its first lead of overtime. Bucknor tied a career-high with five 3-point field goals. Sophomore Drew Crank chipped in with eight points, making 3-of-7 field goals, all with under three seconds on the shot clock.
Richmond's defense held Old Dominion to 16 field goals and 29.6-percent shooting from field. This was the ninth-straight game to start the season that the Spiders have held their opponent under 60 points, the longest stretch since the 1946-47 season. The Monarchs did make 22-of-22 free throws compared to 6-of-7 for Richmond.
"If we continue to work on it, we can get even better at our defense and it's going to need to keep us around," Mooney said. "Defense is going to need to keep us around because, as hard as we work, I don't see those (offensive) droughts completely going away."
The Spiders' Princeton-style offense, which has seen its ups and downs so far this season as the players continue to get comfortable with it, did have droughts Tuesday. But it also worked very well at times, including at the beginning of the game and the play to set up Steenberge's dunk when it mattered most.
"I thought we looked very, very good," Mooney said. "We were able to run our stuff and it seemed like we made it a little more difficult for them to run there's."
Steenberge got Richmond on the board with a jumper and then threw down one of three dunks on the night. Sylla made a jumper for a 6-0 lead and Bucknor came up with a steal and finished on the break to put the Spiders up 8-0.
After a steal by Sylla, Thomas scored on a back-door lay-up and was fouled. His free throw made it 11-0 and Bucknor hit his first 3-pointer of the game to push that advantage to 14-0. Red-shirt freshman Jarhon Giddings connected on a 3-pointer to make it 17-0 with 12:38 remaining.
Old Dominion star Alex Loughton finally put the Monarchs on the scoreboard with a lay-up 8:33 into the game, but Crank and Sylla scored to put the lead to 21-2.
The Monarchs were able to close the gap to 30-17 at the half and opened the second half on an 11-0 run to pull within 30-28 with 14:57 to play. Crank hit one of his patented jumpers with the shot clock running out and then Bucknor hit his first of three second-half treys to push the lead to 35-28.
Another Bucknor 3-pointer made it 38-31 and trey by Thomas opened up a 41-33 lead with 8:49 to play, but Old Dominion used a jumper and four free throws to close within two (41-39). Sophomore Monty Sanders hit a jumper with 4:39 left to put the Spiders up 43-39, but a 3-pointer by Hunter cut the gap to one, the closest the Monarchs had been since the opening minutes of the game.
Bucknor canned a 3-pointer to open up a four-point, 46-42 lead with 3:54 to play, Loughton would make four free throws to tie the game with 2:59 left. Neither team would score in that final 2:59 of regulation with Steenberge coming up with a huge block with three seconds left to force overtime.
Hunter gave Old Dominion a quick lead with a jumper to start the extra session and then the senior stole the ball and made a fast-break lay-up, but he was whistled for a technical foul for taunting.
That proved a big break for the Spiders as Bucknor sank both free throws and Moliva scored on a very athletic move in the paint to tie the game 50-50. Loughton sank two free throws to put Old Dominion back on top by two, but Bucknor's fifth trey of the night put Richmond up 53-52 and Steenberge took it from there with his eight points in the final 1:23.
Richmond returns to action against Wake Forest on Thursday at 7 p.m. in the Robin Center.
