Facing double pressure from the Hostos Caimens, BMCC's Nikola Zilakova (24) gets a jump on her opponents. Photo: Carl Glassman/Tribeca Trib
Trophy-hungry Borough of Manhattan Community College got two chances to score a title last Friday night as both the men's and women's basketballers battled for a CUNY Athletic Conference championship. But despite an often electrifying double-bill before their exuberant home court fans, neither team could make it happen.
Coming off a 60-54 semi-final win over LaGuardia Community College, BMCC’s second-seeded Lady Panthers went up against the regular season champs, Hostos Community College. It was a game that saw the Lady Panthers overcome a 13-point deficit in the first half to edge within two points of the Caimans in the third quarter. But despite that 16-5 run, Hostos powered back for a 66-53 win.
For the men’s team, hoping to get even with LaGuardia after their defeat in last year’s championship matchup, an 11-2 run in the first eight minutes and even their narrow 37-35 half-time lead made that dream look real. But the Red Hawks took their first lead two minutes into the second half, and the game became a nail biter right down to an evened up 62-62, with 6:33 remaining. Then it became LaGuardia all the way, winning 82-69.
Both BMCC teams now look ahead to the Region XV tournament on Feb. 28. "There was a lot of parity in the league this year, and I think our team is playing their best basketball of the season right now, so I do believe we still have an opportunity to do something special," Panthers head coach Tommy Guerin told BMCCAthletics.com [1].
For more detailed recaps on the championship games, go to the CUNY Athletics web site here [2] for the men’s game and here [3] for the women’s.
Links:
[1] http://bmccathletics.com/news/2017/2/18/mens-basketball-four-panthers-named-to-cunyac-all-tournament-team.aspx
[2] http://cunyathletics.com/news/2017/2/18/CCMBB_0218172601.aspx
[3] http://cunyathletics.com/news/2017/2/18/CCWBB_0218172934.aspx