CHARLOTTE – For Queens basketball, Saturday’s first
half must have felt like a perfect Valentine’s Day date, with a five-star meal
and a great celebration. The second half was more like getting a Happy Meal and
getting ghosted.
In the end, the Royals had a happy Valentine’s Day, if not a
satisfying one.
Forward Avantae Parker booked a career-high 22 points and
swatted away six shots, including a key rejection late, to help fend off a
tough Lipscomb team and claim an 87-81 victory at Curry Arena.
“Lipscomb is a really veteran team. They didn’t go away,”
Queens coach Grant Leonard said. “I thought we did a lot of things uncharacteristic
of us – not taking care of the ball and committing 18 turnovers and missing
free throws. That kind of kept it a game and kept it interesting.”
Queens (15-12, 10-4 ASUN) charged out of the gate in the
battle for third place in the league. The Royals seized the lead three-and-a-half
minutes into the game on a Parker layup and clutched it like the last bag of Valentine’s
candy. The Royals scored 20 of the next 31 points to seize a double-digit lead,
then used a personal 5-0 burst from Chris Ashby to stretch it to 14.
The Royals continued making shots, hitting well over 70
percent for much of the half. A Kam Clark bucket swelled the advantage to 20
with 3:47 to play in the opening stanza. Lipscomb (16-11, 9-5) began to set the
tone for its second-half charge, closing the opening half on an 8-2 run to
slice the Queens lead to 52-38 at the interval.
“I think you have to give a lot of credit to them,” Lipscomb
coach Kevin Carroll said after the game. “Their ability to switch one through
five takes away a lot of the advantages that we often are able to create.
Offensively, I thought we had no answer for them in the first half. They were
just scoring at will. They shot like 74 percent or something in the first half.
They had really good schemes.”
“I thought we were not as physical as we needed to be on the
ball and that created a lot of advantages for them. To their credit, they made
the most of them.”
Queens continued to take advantage early in the second
frame. Parker, Nas Mann, and Yoav Berman made consecutive buckets to again
swell the lead back to 20. The Royal lead remained mostly consistent through
the early portion of the period, before the Bisons began capitalizing on Royal
miscues and hitting shots. Lipscomb used a 7-0 charge with three straight makes
and an and-one from Kennedy Okmara to cut it to 10 with 6:30 remaining.
Shortly thereafter, Lipscomb used a Mateo Esmeraldo bucket
and two Ross Candelino free throws to clip the Royal lead into single digits
for the first time in 23 minutes of game action at the 4:39 mark. Lipscomb then
capped scoring 11 of the next 15 with a Charlie Williams three over Carson
Schwieger’s outstretched arms to make it 84-81 before Leonard burned a timeout
with 10 seconds to play.
Berman calmly stepped to the line – on a day when Queens
battled inconsistency with shooting free throws – and knocked home a pair to
essentially ice the game. Parker intercepted a long Lipscomb pass under the
basket and sank a free throw to produce the final score.
“(I’ve been doing) what the team needs,” Berman said. “We
have two amazing shooters in the starting lineup in (guard) Chris (Ashby) and
Carson (Schwieger). We need another guy that is going to attack the rim. I’ve
just been trying to do that. (It’s just) knowing my role.”
Parker blocked six shots on the day, including one on Grant
Asman that prevented the Bisons from trimming the lead to four and gaining
further momentum. The Columbia, S.C., native played the entire day without foul
trouble, which helped contribute to his playing nearly 31 minutes and being a
dominant factor on both ends of the floor.
“I think the biggest thing for him is that he’s been in less
foul trouble,” Leonard said. “He didn’t have a foul in the first half. That’s
elite. Avantae is an unbelievable player. When he’s disciplined and he’s on the
floor, he’s even better. He’s way better on the floor than he is on the bench.”
“Ther eare times where you can get greedy with Avantae
because of his energy and accept the fouls, and I told him we were not going to
do that. We’re going to stay disciplined. Even though he blocked six shots, I
didn’t think he was fouling at all today. I was really proud of him for that.”
The Queens defense notably provided a stout effort against
Lipscomb on the perimeter. The Bisons came into the game shooting 37 percent
from distance and hitting almost 11 threes per game. The Royals held Lipscomb
to 7-for-27 (25.9 percent) from beyond the arc.
“I think they’re the best three-point shooting team in our
league, percentage-wise, and we held them to 26 percent,” Leonard said. “I
thought we were exceptionally bought in on the gameplan.”
“Our team’s starting to build an identity defensively to get
teams to play in isos, which is not the most efficient play in basketball. Our
guys are starting to buy in and trust each other to not overhelp. When they
need to help, they do. When they don’t need to help, we build walls and we take
away the three-point line. In our league, the three-point line is dangerous.
Everyone’s got shooters.”
Carroll credited the Royals for their perimeter
perseverance.
“They have the ability – unlike every team – to switch one
through five,” Carroll said. “They guard everybody with all the players on the
floor. They’re very versatile defensively. When that happens, you don’t have as
many solutions and we didn’t create as many advantages for ourselves. Now,
instead of getting a good look from three, you’re getting a contested three
because they’re not having to help as much. They can create problems with their
length and their athleticism on both ends of the floor.”
Carroll offered an assessment of the slow start and the
fervent finish.
“I was very happy with the fight (we showed),” Carroll said.
“The problem is that you can’t be chasing those points like we did. In the
beginning, we missed some shots around the paint that fueled their transition
offense. They had 14 points in transition in the first half and zero in the
second. Some of that was due to their having the ability to alter shots around
the rim. Some of that had to do with our shooting it, falling down, and creating
five-on-fours on the other end.”
“When you get down 21, you’re scrambling. I think they kind
of fell asleep a little bit. I don’t think the score is indicative of how well
they played and how poorly they made us play.”
Parker’s 22 led Queens and all scorers. The Georgia Southern
transfer hit 9-of-13 from the field and 4-of-5 from the line. Berman added 16,
hitting 5-of-7 from both the field and line and snagging six caroms. Mann and Ashby
booked 11 apiece, hitting a combined 8-of-15 from the field and 4-of-7 from
three. Queens shot 56.5 percent (31-of-53) from the deck and 66.7 percent
(16-of-24) from the line. The Royals bagged nine triples in 22 tries (40.9
percent).
Asman paced the Bisons with 16, hitting 7-of-16 from the
field despite knocking down just 1-of-8 from distance. Williams hit 5-of-7
while contributing 12 points, with Esmeraldo scoring 10 and grabbing five
boards. The Bisons shot 44.9 percent (31-for-69) from the field while equaling
the Royals’ 66.7 percent (12-for-18) from the stripe. Lipscomb hit 7-of-27
(25.9 percent) from the perimeter. The result was the Bisons’ third-lowest
three-point percentage this season, trailing 22.6 percent at Asheville and 23.1
percent at Vanderbilt.
Both teams hit the road Wednesday to continue ASUN play.
Queens ventures to CB&S Bank Arena in Florence, Ala., to square off with
North Alabama. That game is slated for a 7:00 (Eastern) tip, with ESPN+ streaming
the contest. Lipscomb heads to Freedom Hall to take on Bellarmine. That game
will start at 7:30, with ESPN+ providing the coverage.
QUEENS 87, LIPSCOMB 81
LIPSCOMB (16-11, 9-5 ASUN)
Ashkenazi 0-3 0-0 0, Williams 5-7 0-0 12, Asman 7-18 1-3 16,
Esmeraldo 3-6 3-4 10, Candelino 3-10 2-2 8, Sargiunas 2-4 4-6 9, Middleton 3-4
0-0 6, Duncan 3-7 0-0 8, Boylan 2-3 1-2 5, Okpara 3-5 1-1 7. Totals 31-69 12-18
81.
QUEENS (15-12, 10-4)
Parker 9-13 4-5 22, Schwieger 3-7 0-0 9, Mann 5-9 0-0 11,
Ashby 3-6 2-2 11, Berman 5-7 5-7 16, Watford 2-3 5-9 9, Jabriel 3-7 0-1 7,
Larson 0-0 0-0 0, Henry 0-0 0-0 0, Clark 1-1 0-0 2. Totals 31-53 16-24 87.
Halftime: Queens 52-38. 3-Point
goals: Queens 9-22 (Schwieger 3-7, Mann 1-3, Ashby 3-4, Berman 1-3,
Jabriel 1-5), Lipscomb 7-27 (Williams 2-3, Asman 1-8, Esmeraldo 1-1, Candelino
0-6, Sargiunas 1-3, Duncan 2-5, Okpara 0-1). Fouled out: NA. Rebounds: Lipscomb
35 (Candelino 8), Queens 29 (Mann 7). Total fouls: Lipscomb 22, Queens
19. Technicals: NA.
