×

Blue Devil women prep for playoffs with win over Bengals

Special to the OBSERVER

BUFFALO –The Fredonia women’s basketball team opened up a 19-6 lead after one quarter of play and never looked back in taking down Buffalo State, 66-43, on Saturday to close out the regular season. Alexis Cheatham led the way with 21 points, including five 3-pointers.

Jacque Law finished with 10 points and Alisha Szumigala (Forestville) grabbed nine rebounds.

Cheatham shot well from the floor, going seven of 11 from the field and five of eight from three-point range. She also made both of her free throws.

The Devils led by as many as 29 points, coming at the 4:40 mark of the fourth quarter.

Shayasha Spencer had 10 points to top the Bengals, who fall to 7-18 overall and 4-14 in the SUNYAC.

The Devils will enter the SUNYAC Tournament as the No. 5 seed. They will play at Cortland on Tuesday in the quarterfinals.

The Red Dragons and Devils finished the season with identical 11-7 marks. The two teams split their regular season series, with Cortland taking the higher seed by virtue of its season sweep of No. 2 seed New Paltz. Fredonia dropped both its games to the Hawks.

Fredonia stands at 17-8 overall.

Men’s Basketball

Blue Devils drop finale

BUFFALO — The Fredonia men’s basketball team dropped its final game of the season, 60-59, at Buffalo State on Saturday. The loss eliminated the Devils from the playoff picture as they end their season with a 7-11 SUNYAC mark and finish at 10-15 overall.

Buffalo State missed a pair of free throws with 26 seconds left giving the Devils a final opportunity for the win. Nicc Johnson drove to the hoop, but could not get a clear shot for what could have been the game winner.

Ian Helps led the Devils with 16 points and 13 rebounds. Dante Williams finished with 15 points.

The Bengals (16-8 SUNYAC, 10-8 overall) got 15 points off the bench from Dom Grayer, and Lovell Smith had 12.

Fredonia led 29-27 at the half. They opened the second with three straight points to tie their biggest lead of the game at five points, 32-27.

From there, Buff State went on a 20-6 run to build its biggest lead on the game at nine points, 47-38.

Fredonia whittled the lead down to one point in the final minute, but could not get its final shot to fall.

The Devils held a 42-34 edge in rebounds. They converted 18 of 27 free throws (68 percent) compared to 16 of 31 (52 percent) for the Bengals. Buff State held the edge in three pointers, 6 to 3, and converted 39 percent of its shots to Fredonia’s 37 percent.

Men’s Hockey

Devils ‘5’ seed after 6-5 loss to Cortland

CORTLAND — Fredonia closed its regular season Saturday with a 6-5 SUNYAC men’s hockey loss to the Cortland Red Dragons.

The loss dropped the Blue Devils to 13-10-2 overall and 7-8-1 in the conference, good for the No. 5 seed and a road game at No. 4 Buffalo State on Wednesday. Game time is 7 p.m.

Fredonia took an early lead. Samuel Wilbur scored 1:01 into the game, his team-leading 14th and the second in two nights. Before the period ended, the Blue Devils were up 3-0 on goals by Jon Carlson and Bobby Polacek. It was Carlson’s second and Polacek’s ninth of the season.

Carlson’s second goal of the game and third of the season was the only Fredonia goal in the second period, which saw Cortland cut their deficit to 4-3. The Red Dragons pulled even at 4-4 on a goal by Dougie Elgstam 2:32 of the third period before Oskar Gerhardson (Haessleholm, Sweden) put the Blue Devils back on top 5-4 with his fourth of the year.

Cortland’s Nico Gonzalez evened the score and Elgstam scored the game-winner 9:18 into the third period.

Indoor Track & Field

Caparro’s PR now 13th in NCAA’s triple jump

ITHACA — The 14.29-meter triple jump Saturday by Fredonia junior Rocky Caparro was a personal-best and currently the 13th best performance in NCAA Division III this men’s indoor track and field season.

Caparro finished fourth in the event at the Cornell University’s Marc Deneault Invitational. The jump, measured at 46-feet, 10-3/4 inches, was better than his previous best by 10-1/4 inches at an outdoor meet last April.

Several other Fredonia men had personal-bests in their respective events Saturday:

In the 35-pound weight throw by senior Joseph Gabrielli of 14.87 meters (48-9 1/2; 8th place); in the shot put by senior Damone Brown with 14.36 meters (47-1-1/2 inches; 5th place); in the pole vault by sophomore Trent Howard with 4.20 meters (13-9-1/4); in the mile by senior Bobby Cooper with 4:23.63; and in the 3,000 meters by sophomore Zak Kellerman and freshman Kyle Egan, with times of 9:29.37 and 10:00.44, respectively.

Other top eight finishers were sophomore Ethan Francis (Dunkirk), fourth in the mile; senior Kyle Brown, fourth in the weight throw; and junior Merlin Joseph Jr., eighth in the 800. Several other men recorded season-bests.

In the women’s events, Fredonia junior Brittany Feldman defeated 21 other women, including some from NCAA Division I schools, in the 400.

Feldman’s winning time of 57.60 seconds was a season-best and moved her into 11th place on the NCAA Division III indoor track & field performance list for the event. Saturday’s race included runners from several club teams, from Division III schools, and from Division III programs Cornell, Binghamton and Syracuse.

In other events, sophomore Carly DeBono ran a personal-best 5:29.85 in the mile run, and freshmen Fasha Antonio and junior Miranda Warner (Westfield) had PR’s in the 60 hurdles — 10.66 and 10.72 seconds, respectively.

Season-bests were recorded by sophomore Hannah Kurbs in the 3,000 (10:38.86; 6th place); senior Kara Hall in the 5,000 (19:03.59; 2nd place); and senior Bonnie Binggeli in the 800 (2:25.55).

Other top eight event finishers were seniors Julia Johnson and Kelly Vincent in the 5,000, fifth and seventh, respectively; juniors Mikayla Capestrani and Kristen Sawyer in the pole vault, fifth and seventh, respectively; and junior Sarah Couperus, tied for fifth in the high jump and seventh in the triple jump.

Diving

Carlson sweeps SUNYAC’s, sets league record

BUFFALO — Two days after winning the SUNYAC 1-meter springboard diving title, Fredonia senior Arron Carlson did himself one better Friday night.

In a record-setting performance, Carlson won the 3-meter title with a final score of 594.40 points during the conference championship meet at the Burt Flickinger Center. That was better than Geneseo’s Samuel Randall, who finished second with 554.10 points. Randall was the previous conference record holder at 568.45 set last year.

In the process, Carlson remained unbeaten this season — a combined 24-0 record on the 1-meter and 3-meter boards. He will be the obvious choice to be named Male Diver of the Meet when that award is announced Saturday night.

Carlson earned 570.30 points during preliminaries early Friday afternoon. He grabbed the lead with his eighth dive and kept it while holding off Randall. Carlson’s final total broke his own school record of 588.30 points set one year ago to the day.

Jake Storms, however, recorded a personal-best 467.20 points after his 11 preliminary dives and finished the event with 464.15 points, good for sixth place and 13 team points. The Owego High School graduate and Blue Devil senior also set a personal-best Wednesday during the 1-meter competition.

Fredonia’s strong day off the 3-meter board included a 10th-place finish by freshman Christian Krasnek. His 444.45 points following the consolation final earned nine team points for the Bue Devils.

The three divers have accounted for 81 of Fredonia’s 305.5 team points after three days of competition. The Blue Devils head into Saturday in third place.

All three Fredonia men have qualified for NCAA Division III Northeast/South Zone Diving to be held Feb. 24-25 at Ithaca College.

Newsletter

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *
   

Starting at $4.62/week.

Subscribe Today