CORTLAND, N.Y. — The Oswego State Men’s Basketball team took to the road Saturday afternoon to take on the Cortland Red Dragons. They continued their hot streak with a 72-64 win. The game started well for the Lakers, building a double digit lead early in the first half. Devin Green had eight points and Brendon Mulson had seven on the way to 21-11 lead with nine to go in the first. The Red Dragons weren’t letting the Lakers get away, a 10-2 run brought them right back into the game. The Lakers would hold the lead at the half 34-29. The Lakers shot 35% from the field and a cool 5-19 from deep. Cortland shot 32% from the field and 4-15 from three.
The Red Dragons came out of the locker rooms hot, a 15-8 run helped them take a 44-42 lead with fifteen to play. Ahkee Anderson scored seven points, and a Mulson layup, would get lead lead back to five at 51-46. The teams would trade baskets the rest of the game, and two made free throws from Green saw the Lakers close the game out, 72-64. Brendon Mulson was Lakers leading scorer with fourteen while adding six rebounds. Jeremiah Sparks had thirteen points to go with eight rebounds. Christian Simmons had a double double, eleven points and eleven rebounds. Devin Green added twelve and Ahkee Anderson had eleven, both with seven boards.
The Lakers travel to the Geneseo for their next game on Tuesday, January 25. Tip off is set for 7:30 p.m. in Geneseo. Oswego currently sits at 15-1 (9-0 SUNYAC) and are ranked #25 in the country.
IMAGE PROVIDED BY OSWEGO ATHLETICS DEPARTMENT
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Oswego State men’s basketball take three wins on the road
OSWEGO N.Y. — The Lakers took a full week of games head on, winning all three games they played including two huge scoring outputs. The first game of the week came on Tuesday against the Buffalo State Bengals in Buffalo, the final score a whopping 109-72, the first of two times they would score 109 this week. The game started close, 11-10 after five minutes with Devin Green connecting from deep twice. Oswego would take off from there, a 19-5 scoring run with six points from Ahkee Anderson and ten from Christian Simmons saw the lead grow to 30-15. The Lakers would score 24 more over the next ten minutes, and would go into the half with a commanding 52-32 lead. Oswego was an excellent 54.3% from the field in the first half, and 47% from beyond the arc. The second half was just more Oswego domination, the lead wouldn’t fall below twenty, and was up to forty with a minute to go. A few garbage time points from the Bengals saw a final score of 109-72. The Lakers were led by twenty-two from Simmons, who added eight rebounds. Green added seventeen to the score line, 5-10 from three on the night. Anderson and Jamal Achille had fourteen and twelve respectively. Four other lakers would have more than eight points.
Game two of the week came on the road against the Potsdam Bears. A tighter contest on the scoreboard saw Oswego win 76-58. The Lakers would find themselves down one after ten minutes. Devin Green helped keep it close with a pair of threes early. A Jeremiah Sparks lay-up would cap off a 12-2 Lakers run that would take the lead for Lakers, 29-20. The Lakers and Bears would go back and forth the remainder of the half and would go into the locker rooms with Oswego up 40-29. The Lakers capitalized on turnovers scoring twelve of their points on seven Potsdam turnovers. The Bears didn’t let the lead grow too much to start the second half, the score was 51-36 after the first five minutes. Ahkee Anderson would assist on back to back baskets and the lead would grow to nineteen. With seven minutes remaining in the game, the Bears had cut the lead to only seven. Successful threes and good defense helped the Bears get back into the game. Julien Crittendon would hit a three to extend the lead back to ten and take momentum back from Potsdam. The Lakers would use the momentum to close the game out for the final score of 76-58. Crittendon would lead the team in points with seventeen. Jamal Achille had sixteen on the night while sharing the rebound lead with Sparks at nine. Sparks would add twelve of his own.
The final game of the week was against the Plattsburgh Cardinals in Plattsburgh. It was domination again for the Lakers as they won 109-70. Plattsburgh took four of the first six points before the Lakers took the reigns of the game. Eighteen straight points over four and half minutes saw the Lakers take the lead that would last the rest of the game. The Lakers had over half their points in the first half, going into the locker rooms up 62-31. The Lakers utilized their bench during the half, with 38 of their points being from the bench. The defense was also on the point forcing sixteen turnovers. The Lakers extended their lead to 45 over the first eight minutes of the second half. Both teams would go back and forth through the rest of the game and get to the final of 109-72. Five Lakers would hit the double digit scoring mark, freshman Marcus Shelton leading the team with fourteen off the bench. Christian Simmons added thirteen points and seven rebounds, with Devin Green, Jeremiah Sparks, and Kaleb Cook all with ten. Ahkee Anderson and Brendon Mulson added nine each. 66 of the Lakers points came from the bench. The team shot 53.8% from the field, while also an excellent 16-20 from the free throw line.
Oswego’s winning streak now sits at ten games and they have a record of 13-1 (7-0 SUNYAC). Coming into the week they sat just two spots out of the top 25 with 28 points, number 25, Emory, has 40 points. Their next game is against the Geneseo Knights in Oswego on Tuesday, January 18. Geneseo is second in the SUNYAC also undefeated in conference play at 6-0 and are 8-4 on the year.
IMAGE PROVIDED BY OSWEGO ATHLETICS DEPARTMENT
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Pickett Seals Lakers 2022 Max Ziel Tournament Win
OSWEGO, NY – Women’s Basketball continues to impress early on in the 2022-23 season as they won the 2022 Max Ziel Tournament and stay undefeated at 3-0. The Lakers got the tournament started by taking down the Keystone College Giants 86-84 in OT.The first quarter was competitive as there were eight lead changes in the quarter. The Lakers went 3-8 from the field goal line in the first quarter and would outscore the Giants 19-11 in rebounds. The second quarter saw three more lead changes as both teams would score 17 points in the quarter as the score was tied at 35 going into the half. In the third quarter, there were eight more lead changes as the game continued to be a back-and-forth battle between the Lakers and the Giants.
The Lakers would lead 62-28 going into the fourth quarter but Keystone began to pull away in the fourth. Karleigh Leo helped rally the Lakers back as she had ten points in the final four minutes of the fourth to bring the game to overtime at 77. In overtime, both teams went back-and-forth until Diamond Pickett grabbed an offensive rebound and scored with 1.8 seconds left in overtime. A last-second three-point attempt by Keystone’s Riley Berry failed as the Lakers won 86-84 in OT. Leo would lead the Lakers on the day with 23 points while Pickett had scored 14 points. Despite the losing effort, Berry had 33 points in the game with a total of 58 throughout the whole entire tournament including going 13-25 from the three-point line. She was able to earn herself an All-Tournament Player award for her team for the tournament.
In the second game, the Lakers rode the momentum they had against Keystone into their game against the Suny Poly Wildcats winning 65-64. The Wildcats came off a day one win in the tournament against Morrisville defeating them 63-55.
The Lakers started off the game with back-to-back three-pointers from Karleigh Leo and Logan Castiglione to put the Lakers up 6-2 early in the first quarter. The Wildcats were able to maintain a three-point lead going into the second quarter but the Lakers would go on a 13-point run to lead 27-17. Poly would rally back though and would cut the deficit to four. The Lakers would lead 33-29 going into halftime.
Karleigh Leo would go off in the third quarter with four three-pointers as the Wildcats had no answers for her. The Lakers would begin to pull away from the Wildcats 59-48 at the end of the third. The Wildcats would rally back in the fourth despite both teams struggling offensively. Diamond Pickett proved to be the difference maker once again as she scored the game-winning basket with nine seconds remaining. Logan Castiglione would win the All-Tournament Player award for Oswego as she had 19 points to go along with 11 field goals made in both games. Karleigh Leo would win the MVP for the tournament after her incredible performance in both games where she recorded 40 points along with going 15-37 from the field-goal line.
The Lakers will stay home to face Wells College on Wednesday, November 16th at the Max Ziel Gymnasium at 7 PM. The Lakers will look to stay undefeated this season as they look for their first four 4-0 start since the 2010-11 season. Additionally, they will be looking for their first four-game win streak since the 2012-13 season.
PHOTO CREDITS PROVIDED BY OSWEGO STATE ATHLETICS
