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George Visconti, Michael Caprise help Swarthmore win nailbiter to go to NCAA Division III Final Four

SWARTHMORE — Instead of crushing it, as Swarthmore College had done throughout the NCAA Division III tournament, the Garnet showed they could win a close one Saturday night at Tarble Pavilion.

Michael Caprise’s post-up basket with 5.8 ticks left put the Garnet ahead, and a turnover ended the upset bid of Nichols, which moped off the floor on the wrong side of a 78-77 setback. The crowd spilled onto the floor as the speakers blared the Black Eyed Peas’ “Tonight’s going to be a good night.” All that was left was to cut down the nets.

It was an amazing comeback in that the Bison led by 11 points at several stages of the second half, a deficit that seemed a lot larger to a Garnet squad that had won by an average of 25 points throughout the tournament.

“Nichols was incredible,” Garnet coach Landry Kosmalski said. “They were very disruptive. At the end we just kind of simplified things offensively, we were able to get to the point and then we really buckled down and got stops. Mike made the big shot at the end. Vinny DeAngelo got going a little bit, George Visconti made shots. It was everybody. Happy to be moving on.”

Visconti topped the Garnet (28-3) with 23 points while DeAngelo, the pride of Sun Valley, scored all 15 of his points in the second half. Caprise, Colin Shaw and George Corzine scored a dozen points each.

For the longest time it looked like the Garnet would suffer the ignominy of watching their opponent cut down the nets at Tarble. Quincy Ferebee scored 27 points, Tilquan Rucker had 20 and Tavon Jones added 19 for the Bison (26-6), who had won 20 straight games.

The Bison led by nine points until Visconti knocked down a triple with 3:36 left. A DeAngelo basket got the Garnet within three points with 1:31 remaining. Then Visconti stepped up with a jumper and a trey cutting the deficit to 77-76 with 48.3 ticks remaining.

But Ferebee dribbled the ball off his leg on a clear-out resulting in a shot clock violation, and that set Caprise up for probably the biggest basket of his career.

“I was just hoping to get a bucket,” Caprise said. “I’m just glad we get to play together for another week. These are my favorite people in the world, and we get to do something we love for another week. And I am so happy for that.”

Kosmalski and Bison counterpart Brock Erickson dipped deep into their strategic coaching reserves in the first half.

The Bison kept the ball from Garnet scoring leader DeAngelo, who got just three shots and zero points in the first half.

When Ferebee wasn’t locked up with DeAngelo, the Bison double-teamed the point guard and that drained the shot clock and prevented the Garnet from making the myriad passes it’s accustomed to in its set offense.

Kosmalski turned to a low post game with big guys Caprise and Corzine, and they delivered 18 first-half points, 10 by Corzine.

That left Shaw to stretch the defense from the perimeter, as he made three of four triples on his way to nine points.

Ferebee was on fire. He scored 10 points on a variety of shots to stake the Bison to a 14-11 lead five minutes into the game. Driving the lane, shooting the triple or hitting floaters, it didn’t matter to Ferebee.

But the Garnet was getting a career effort from big man Corzine, who made his first four shots in the blocks.

The Garnet made just 15 of 32 shots (.468) in the first half and trailed by seven points at the intermission.


Source: Berkshire mont

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