Feb. 12, 2010

Box Score

WESTMINSTER, MD - The Johns Hopkins men's basketball team sank seven of eight free throws in the final 50 seconds to seal a 65-56 win at McDaniel Friday afternoon. The Blue Jays complete the season sweep of the Green Terror and improve to 10-11 on the season and 6-8 in the Centennial Conference. The Green Terrors lose their sixth straight and fall to 8-14 overall and 4-11 in the Centennial Conference.

Trailing by 10 at 58-48, McDaniel got six points onthree straight possessions to trim the deficit to four with just 53 seconds to play. But that's as close as the Green Terror would get as the Blue Jays went seven-of-eight from the line and forced the Terror into just one-of-five shooting from the field to take the win.

Despite having not played a game in nine days, the Blue Jays didn't show any rust early, jumping out to a 13-4 lead. Seniors Andrew Farber-Miller (Charlottesville, VA/St. Anne's-Belfield) and Pat O'Connell (Baltimore, MD/Loyola Blakefield) combined for all 13 points in the opening run. McDaniel answered with a 10-0 run to take a 14-13 lead following a Tyler Rudd jumper.

O'Connell hit a 15-footer and sophomore Tim McCarty (Warrington, PA/Germantown Academy) hit one of two free throws and the Blue Jays led by two. A Woody Butler dunk on the other end swung the lead back to McDaniel with 10:23 to play in the half. Junior Mike Henrici (Wayne, PA/Conestoga) swished one to take back the lead and kick start a 8-0 Blue Jay run. Hopkins would maintain its lead until a Karl Nelson three-pointer with 47 seconds to play knotted the game at 32-32. The teams would go into the lockerroom all tied up.

Coming out of the half, the lead went back and forth as the lead changed hands eight times in the first 10 minutes. Rudd gave McDaniel its last lead of the game at 11:20, but it was quickly answered by Henrici, who scored nine of Hopkins next 10 points to give the Blue Jays a 52-45 lead. Nelson hit another bucket from downtown to trim the defict back to four. But Hopkins quickly pushed it back to 10 with just over three minutes to play, before McDaniel made one final push.

O'Connell paced the Blue Jays with 20 points, thanks to a 9-of-10 showing from the free throw line. It is his second consecutive 20-point game and the fifth of his career. Farber-Miller finished with a double-double, his fourth of the season, on 17 points and 10 rebounds. Henrici also finished in double figures with 13 points, with 11 of those coming in the final 11 minutes of the second half. Butler led McDaniel, finishing with a game-high 23 points. Nelson, who finished with 10 points, was the only other player for the Green Terror to finish in double figures.

Hopkins shot better than 50.0 percent from the field for the third consecutive game, finishing at a 57.1 percent clip. The Blue Jays shot 61.1 percent in the second half. The Green Terror were hot from the field in the first half, converting 60.0 percent of their shots, but shooting just 36.4 percent in the second.

Hopkins, which began a stretch of five games in eight days due to the blizzards that hit the region last week, return home to take on Haverford on Saturday, February 13 at 1:00 pm. The game is the Blue Jays' annual Wall-O'Mahony game, which honors alumi Glen Wall and Matt O'Mahony, who died in the attacks on the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001. An MVP from each team will be presented following the game.