Lyons see second-half lead slip away in 70-58 loss to SUNYIT

LAKE BUENA VISTA, FL- The Wheaton College men's basketball team saw its 15-point lead in the second half slip away at the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) Holiday Festival on Wednesday, as the Lyons dropped a 70-58 decision to the State University of New York Institute of Technology (SUNYIT) in the Milk House Arena at Disney's Wide World of Sports Complex.

Wheaton falls to 4-6 with the loss, while the Wildcats, who qualified for last year's NCAA Tournament, raised their overall record to 7-3.

Junior Anthony Coppola (Watertown, MA/Watertown) led Wheaton with 14 points, while senior Ben Stehle (Newton, MA/Newton South) turned in a double-double of 13 points and 11 rebounds.  Freshman Scott Faucher (Lebanon, NH/Kimball Union Academy) drained a trio of threes for nine points, and sophomore Brendan Degnan (Narragansett, RI/Bishop Hendricken) had five assists.

For SUNYIT, senior Diloo Brown (Harlem, NY/Technical Careers Institute) paced all scorers with 22 points in addition to having five assists and three steals.  Junior David Golembiowski (Barneveld, NY/Holland Patent) finished with 20 points and 10 boards, while classmate Kevin Cappiello (Youngsville, NY/Sullivan West) added 10 points and three steals.

Two Faucher threes sparked a 10-2 Wheaton run to open the second stanza, providing the Lyons with a 45-30 advantage with under 16 minutes to play, but the Wildcats stormed back with 16 of the game's next 19 points to trail 48-46 at the 11-minute mark.  SUNYIT went 7-of-8 during its run that spanned 4:34.  After Coppola hit a three at 10:45 that made the score 51-46, the Wildcats knocked down four threes during a 14-2 spurt to 60-53 lead at 4:46.  Another Coppola triple made it 60-56 at 4:08, but Wheaton got no closer, as the Lyons didn't score during the last 3:31.

In the second frame, SUNYIT shot 62.5 percent from the floor and 58.3 percent from deep, while Wheaton hit a cold spell, shooting 36.0 percent from the field while not visiting the free throw line.  For the game, the Lyons assisted 16 of their 21 field goals and outrebounded the Wildcats by a 36-27 count but committed 20 turnovers while only forcing 12.  SUNYIT was 13-of-20 at the charity stripe, and Wheaton was 5-of-6.

In a first half that saw Wheaton hold SUNYIT to 33.3 percent shooting from the field and just 15.4 percent beyond the three-point stripe, the Lyons used a 14-4 run to snap a 21-all tie and forge ahead 35-25 with 1:13 to go before the break.  The Blue and White carried a 35-28 lead into the locker room, holding a 23-13 rebounding advantage while connecting on 46.2 percent of its three-point tries.  Stehle shot 5-of-7 for 11 points to go alongside seven rebounds, which included three on the offensive glass. 

Wheaton returns to action in 2010 when the Lyons host Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI), which has earned at least a share of the past six New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) regular season titles, on January 6 in Emerson Gymnasium at 5:30 p.m.  The Engineers are receiving votes in the latest D3hooops.com national poll.