Box Score (New/Sortable Format) INDIANA, Pa. – On Monday night, the Edinboro men's basketball team won a playoff game for the first time under head coach
Pat Cleary. They liked it so much that on Wednesday, the fourth-seeded Fighting Scots upset top-seed Indiana(Pa.) at the Kovalchick Complex, 79-63, to advance to the PSAC Final Four for the first time since 2008.
Picked to finish eighth in the PSAC West in the Coaches' Preseason Poll, Edinboro improved to 18-10 with the victory. IUP, ranked sixth in the latest NCAA Division II Atlantic Region rankings, fell to 22-8 and must now wait until Sunday night to see if they gain a berth into the NCAA Tournament.
The Crimson Hawks had dominated the series of late, winning six in a row and nine of ten meetings during Cleary's five-year reign. Overall, they had won 19 of the last 20 meetings.
The Fighting Scots will play East Stroudsburg, the top seed in the Eastern Division, in the semifinals on Saturday, March 3 at 3:30 p.m. Gannon, the second seed in the PSAC West, meets the East's number two seed West Chester at 1 p.m. in the other semifinal. The two winners will meet on Sunday, March 4 at 3 p.m. for the PSAC championship and the automatic berth into the NCAA Division II Tournament.
Edinboro gained control early in the contest against an IUP team that was forced to play with Anthony Glover (suspension) and Dante Lombardi (injury). The lead exchanged hands three times in the first three minutes before
Anthony Coleman's 3-pointer gave the Fighting scots the lead for good at 8-5.
That started a 17-5 run for the Fighting Scots as they went up 20-10 with 11 minutes remaining in the half.
Jaymon Mason and
Keshawn Liggins led the way with five points apiece. IUP would hit a pair of 3-pointers to make it 20-16 with ten minutes remaining.
Edinboro gradually rebuilt the lead, and Mason's three gave the Scots a 35-24 advantage with 2:53 left. Coleman capped the first half with a buzzer-beating 3-pointer for a 40-27 lead at the half. The Fighting Scots made 8-of-19 3-pointers over the first 20 minutes and had a 12-1 advantage in second half points. They forced the Crimson Hawks into 10 turnovers.
The Fighting Scots never gave IUP an opportunity to cut into the lead by much. A tip-in by Blake Danielak with 17:08 remaining made it 42-34, but Edinboro ran off the next nine points, on 3-pointers by Coleman, Liggins, and
Mike Beck, to grab the biggest lead of the night at 51-34.
IUP never got closer than 11 points the rest of the way, the last time at 69-58 with 4:35 remaining, but over the next minute-and-a-half, Mason drained six straight free throws.
Mason, a redshirt senior guard, led all scorers with 24 points, giving him 1,999 for his career. Edinboro's all-time leading scorer as of Saturday made 7-of-17 field goals, including 4-of-10 3-pointers, and was 6-of-6 at the line. He added six assists without a turnover.
Liggins, the PSAC's leading scorer, added 22 points on 8-of-14 field goals, 4-of-7 3-pointers, and 2-of-2 free throws. The senior forward now has 670 points, the third-highest total in a season. He pulled down six rebounds. Coleman made 6-of-9 field goals, including 3-of-5 from beyond the arc to finish with 15 points as Edinboro's Big Three accounted for 61 points. Coleman led Edinboro with nine rebounds.
IUP had four players in double figures, led by Jacobo Diaz and Willem Brandwijk with 16 points apiece. Diaz led the Crimson Hawks with nine rebounds, while Brandwijk added six. Malik Miller added 14 points and Danielak 11.
Edinboro shot 49.1 percent from the field (28-of-57), including 13-of-29 3-pointers. The Fighting Scots were a perfect 10-for-10 from the line. IUP shot 46.3 percent (25-of-54), going 7-of-22 on 3-pointers, and went 6-of-10 at the line.
The Fighting Scots held a slight 30-29 rebounding advantage, and committed 12 turnovers compared to 15 for the Crimson Hawks.
