Holy Family Men's Basketball Captures CACC Title with an Impressive Victory
2015-16 CACC MEN'S BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP BRACKET // 2015-16 CACC BASKETBALL CHAMPIONSHIP PHOTO GALLERY
ORANGEBURG, N.Y. (March 5, 2016) -- The Holy Family University men's basketball team had come close the last few seasons in its quest for a Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference (CACC) Championship, but each time had come up just short. Saturday night, though, the Tigers didn't leave any doubt.
The South's top seed shot a solid 45 percent from the field and forced Philadelphia University into 22 turnovers, as the Tigers won by a count of 87-68 at the Hennessy Center in Orangeburg, N.Y. to claim the 2015-16 CACC Championship.
Holy Family also locked up the league's automatic bid to the NCAA Division II East Region Tournament next week and will wait to hear word tomorrow night if it locked up the No. 1 seed in the Regional and the right to host the event. The announcement will be made on Sunday night on NCAA.com(.)
Reggie Charles tossed in a game-high 27 points, while Marvin Crawford locked up tournament most-valuable-player honors with 19 points (50% shooting), seven rebounds, three steals, one block and an assist. Eric Flemming added 12 points to round out the double-figure scorers for Holy Family (26-5).
Derrick Stewart also played a major role in Holy Family's terrific defensive effort with three thefts and a block. Isaiah Gans and James McDonnell each swatted away a pair of shots.
Holy Family scored 16 of the game's first 21 points in the opening five minutes to grab the upperhand early and never look back. Charles kick-started the opening salvo with seven-consecutive points, while Flemming, Crawford and Stewart each rained in a triple.
The Tigers continued to build on its lead, pushing it out to 17 a few minutes later on a layup from Xavier Williams.
Mike Louden tried to rally the Rams late to give them some momentum heading into the locker room at halftime, as he poured in five-straight points on a jumper and deep three-pointer. PhilaU trimmed the deficit to 36-25 at the break, but HFU countered coming out of the locker room.
Charles went on a mini 5-0 run of his own 90 seconds in to make it 44-28 and the Tigers cruised from there. Holy Family's lead eventually swelled to 27 points at one point late in the game.
Brendan Kilpatrick had 17 points to lead the Rams, while TJ Huggins netted 14. Philadelphia fell to 23-8 and will wait its word on a potential at-large bid to next week's Regional. Huggins, along with Peter Alexis, were named to the all-tournament team.
The teams were meeting for the third time this season with the Tigers taking a 2-1 edge in the 2015-16 series. Holy Family won at home back in December, while PhilaU won on its homecourt a couple weeks ago in February.
The Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference is an NCAA Division II Conference composed of 14 institutions in Connecticut, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, and Pennsylvania. The member institutions are Bloomfield College, Caldwell University, Chestnut Hill College, Concordia (N.Y.) College, Dominican (N.Y.) College, Felician University, Georgian Court University, Goldey-Beacom College, Holy Family University, Nyack College, Philadelphia University, Post University of Waterbury, University of the Sciences, and Wilmington University.
2015-16 CACC ALL-TOURNAMENT TEAM
Peter Aguilar (Concordia)
Sho Da-Silva (USciences)
Claude Blue (Bloomfield)
TJ Huggins (Philadelphia)
Peter Alexis (Philadelphia)
Marvin Crawford (Holy Family)
Reggie Charles (Holy Family)
Derrick Stewart (Holy Family)
MVP: Marvin Crawford (Holy Family)