Bulldogs Look Solid Against Under-Manned Vermont
NEW HAVEN, Conn. – Mike Lonergan had a sense of how this game was going to go.
“I said we’re going to play our butts off and we’re going to be dead in the end,” said the Vermont head coach after his team lost 86-76 to Yale on Saturday.
The Catamounts did just that, even leading 39-37 at the half after Yale scored the first 10 points of the game. They stayed in the game by out-hustling the Bulldogs, getting most loose balls and then with Mike Trimboli (career-high 32 points on 12-20 shooting) coming alive.
But in the second half, Yale’s depth wore the injury-riddled Catamounts down and their defense improved. A decisive 9-0 run was sparked by freshman Alex Zampier, who had 12 points in his second consecutive fine outing for the Bulldogs. They also got a double-digit effort from Travis Pinick off the bench, showing the difference their depth made.
“We thought our depth was going to be important, and it turned out that it was,” said Yale head coach James Jones. “Alex has been sparking us off the bench all season long.”
The Bulldogs came into the game with a 2-5 record, but a deceiving one. They haven’t played a bad team yet and have been on the road for most of the season, so getting a home game on Saturday helped. It was also a plus to win Saturday after winning at Fairfield earlier in the week, giving them two straight after a 1-5 start against the likes of UMass, Stanford, UCLA and Holy Cross, among others.
“We think we have the potential to be a pretty good basketball team, so we know that we’re going to win some,” said Jones. “The fact that we’ve played such a difficult schedule has made that hard so far. But that’s what we want to learn from and try to get better through those games, and hopefully that’s going to help us now and down the road.”
In a wide-open Ivy League, the Bulldogs are regarded as one of the favorites. Although their 3-5 mark isn’t exceptional, their tough schedule and the fact that no team in the league has truly distinguished itself in non-conference play means they have done nothing to dispel the notion that they should contend. If anything, they have helped their case based on what Saturday showed.
The Bulldogs have a solid veteran starting five, led by Ivy League Player of the Year candidate Eric Flato. He’s capably flanked by two more seniors, twins Nick and Caleb Holmes, with Matt Kyle and junior Ross Morin up front. Morin is the only non-senior starter, and he’s started plenty of games in his career.
Off the bench, Pinick and Zampier have emerged as solid contributors whom Jones describes as being “like two starters in terms of their ability to play”. The only other player who gets significant minutes after that is freshman Paul Nelson, but the Bulldogs’ top seven is very solid all the way around. Additionally, Flato is the only player who averages over 28 minutes per game (he averages 33.9), so the top seven won’t be worn down come Ivy League play.
And although they may not have a sparkling won-loss record by that time, this veteran team knows how to deal with the effects of a challenging schedule.
“Nobody’s really concerned with what our record looks like,” said Flato, who led the Bulldogs with 20 points and five assists. “Last year, we didn’t have a great record before Ivy League, and (the schedule) helped us out. We won 10 of our last 14 games.”
Their opponent on Saturday has the opposite problem. The Catamounts’ injuries have not only mounted, but they’ve also been concentrated in the frontcourt. Marqus Blakely, who has emerged as a potential star in the early going, is out indefinitely with a stress reaction in his foot. It’s unknown how soon he could come back, although a report in the Burlington Free Press said he could be back in a couple of weeks. They were also missing senior Timothy McCrory and freshman Evan Fjeld.
That meant that little-used Kyle Robbins and Jordan Dean played in the game, while Freshman Garrett Kissel was in for eight minutes after averaging under six per game coming in. For good measure, four of the Catamounts’ starters played at least 35 minutes.
Lonergan’s hope is simple: get healthy. He’s not worried about the team’s confidence. If the Catamounts get healthy by the time America East play arrives, they could be a team to be reckoned with given their guard play and the emergence of Blakely.
