Debutante Daemen Heading to First Elite-8
The Faux Regional is over, paving the way to an emasculated Elite-8 as the 2021 D2 basketball season painfully plods its way toward a merciful conclusion.
Cancel Culture ostensibly left its mark on the regional basketball landscape this winter as 22 of the East’s 37 teams elected to sit out the season, including the vast majority of members in the region’s elite conference – the NE10 (Franklin Pierce only managed to play two games).
With that depressing perspective, we congratulate the team that emerged from the “pack,” such as it was: the Daemen Wildcats, who advanced to the Elite-8 for the first time in program history, achieving the feat with two wins in Albany, and cutting down the nets one night after their female counterparts completed the same success on their home floor in Amherst, NY. That makes Daemen just the second team from these parts to have both its teams represented at the Elite-8 (Saint Anselm in 2019), making it essentially the second time in a row since last year there were no regionals.
The 10-5 Wildcats punched their ticket by avenging a 16-point loss to ECC archrival St. Thomas Aquinas in the conference tournament championship game nine days earlier, holding off STAC in the biggest game of the season, 71-70. It also marked the second time in four meetings (none at home) over an 18-day span that they had met the ECC champs, after having split a “doubleheader” the last weekend of the regular season in Sparkill. That means Daemen was the only team to knock off the 14-2 Spartans this year, accounting for both their losses. In those four meetings, the turnover difference was a whopping 76-35 in favor of STAC, with mistake points resulting in a 92-43 disparity. Yet, the Wildcats were able to overcome that formidable pressure, gaining the split primarily due to Sischo, who scored 25, 26, 27 and 28 (though not in that order) on 70% shooting (42-60), including 3-of-8 from long range, while pulling down 45 rebounds (11.3) and blocking seven shots. It also helped that the team shot at least 50% from the floor in all four matchups (51% overall).
The two top-seeded teams – both of whom received first-round byes – cruised in their semifinal triumphs as STAC thumped old NAIA rival Caldwell, 95-72 (leading by as much as 33) and Daemen had little trouble with Bloomfield in another pairing of former NAIA clubs, crafting a 26-point bulge before settling for an 81-69 victory.
The final was a tight tilt throughout, with only one double-digit spread at 50-40 DC early in the second half. But a 10-0 Spartans run quickly erased it as the two teams would be separated by no more than one possession over the last 13:46, except for a 65-60 Spartans advantage inside of the final five minutes. National Player of the Year candidate Andrew Sischo completed a go-ahead 3-point play at the 1:46 mark, giving the Wildcats the lead for good, then added two more free throws 23 seconds later to cap a decisive 9-0 spurt. Sischo – a native of Guilderland, NY who was playing in his backyard – sank the decisive blow at the line with three seconds left, making it 71-67 and rendering meaningless a Grant Singleton 3-pointer with less than a second to go.
Sischo – a fifth-year senior who will can play again next year due to the COVID waiver – finished with 25 points and 13 rebounds in earning Regional MOP honors. Senior shooter Kyle Harris was equally instrumental for the winners with 21 points, nailing six of 10 from beyond the arc, including three straight bombs that provided Daemen with its largest lead.
Star junior forward Osbel Caraballo finished with 21 for the stunned Spartans, who were – for what it’s worth – the only nationally ranked team in the region. Making the Wildcats’ story even more remarkable were the facts that one of their team vans was hit by a semi on a snowy Thruway stretch while heading to a game at Roberts Wesleyan last month (miraculously, no one was injured and the game was postponed). In addition, no fewer than nine players opted out during the season, compromising the team’s depth and leading Head Coach Mike MacDonald to utilize a far less liberal substitution pattern than he would have liked.
The regional final was the first between two New York schools since 2017 when St. Thomas Aquinas outlasted Saint Rose in Syracuse. With the win, Daemen becomes the third team from the Empire State to advance to its first Elite-8 in the last four regionals, beginning with that STAC win in 2017 and including Le Moyne’s championship the following year. Expanding the focus to include the women, both regional title games were all-ECC affairs with each participant hailing from New York (again, take that for what it’s worth as the many contenders in New England and Philly sat this one out).
So now it’s off to Evansville, Indiana for the Wildcats – one of two teams playing on D2’s grand stage for the first time, joining Flagler (FL), which emerged from the South Regional that was minus perennial powers Florida Southern and Nova Southeastern, among others. Daemen was named as the #8 seed today and will face top seed West Texas A&M in a week's time. We wish them the best as the quest continues to end the East Region’s national championship drought, which dates back to Lowell’s 1988 title run.
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