By Paul Gotham
ALBANY, N.Y. — That a college basketball team connected on fifty percent of its shots from the field and lost merits noting. For said team to fall by double digits might raise a few eyebrows until one considers its opponent: the Iona Gaels.
That’s the way it went late Sunday afternoon at the Times-Union Center.
Isaiah Williams led a record-breaking performance as Iona defeated the Monmouth Hawks, 95-77 and advanced to Monday night’s MAAC championship game for the third year in a row.
Williams, who only recently returned to the lineup after being injured, set an individual MAAC championship record hitting nine three-pointers – part of a team conference tournament record 19 treys.
“Obviously makes the games easier when you shoot like that,” Iona’s Tim Cluess said. “We have very good shooters, and we practice and put a lot of time into it.”
Williams, playing in just his fourth game since returning from a foot injury which sidelined him 12 contests, hit four of seven from long range in the first half. A glance at the box score might indicate he has fully recovered.
“No, I’m not 100 percent back,” the junior guard stated. “I’m just happy I made my shots. My teammates were looking for me.”
Williams set a career-high with nine 3-balls and matched his career-best points.
“Honestly, I’m a little bit shocked,” Cluess said. “The last practice we had before the tournament, in all fairness, he was limping up and down the court. We were trying to get him off the court as often as possible, yet try to get him some reps in some of the sets. I honestly didn’t know if he’d be 25 percent.”
Williams registered a double-double with 16 points and 11 rebounds in Iona’s victory over Siena on Saturday.
“He’s been great,” Cluess added. “I think it’s his mental toughness. I think he knows it’s playoff time. He knows every game matters, and he’s fighting through it. He’s putting on a good display for everybody here.”
Iona took 35 of their 63 shots for the game from long range actually connecting on fewer (13) inside the arc.
“That’s how they play,” Monmouth’s King Rice commented. “Coach (Cluess) coaches to it, and he recruits to it. Those guys make shots.”
But with all those attempts nary a heat check three was needed. Moving the ball around the perimeter as smoothly and deftly as Hillary Clinton wards off questions about her email account, the Gaels dished out 24 assists.
“It paid off for our guys tonight,” Cluess said. “The trust they had in each other to find the open man because the shots we were getting were wide open. That helps percentages.”
Williams drilled a pair of catch-and-shoot treys midway through the second half to give Iona a 75-59 advantage. Monmouth did not climb within single digits for the remainder of the contest. Freshman Schadrac Casimir fed Williams with one of his five helpers on the night to start the spurt.
“Our team really likes each other,” Casimir said. “When we see one person doing well, we all get motivated. We all just feed off each other.”
Casimir drilled all four of his attempts from the three-point line and added 16.
Kelvin Amayo finished with game-highs of seven assists and 11 rebounds.
“He makes you come to him and come off a shooter,” Rice said of Amayo’s ability to get in the paint off the dribble.
A.J. English scored just ten of his game-high 29 after the break, but the junior guard connected on a pair of trifecta early in the second half.
“Coach came in and said ‘we’re playing Iona basketball for the first time in a long time,’” English noted of the halftime discussion. “Basically I think that put a lot of motivation in people…When we played them we were down before, and we came back, so we don’t want the same thing to happen. Basically, we just tried to keep locked in and finish the two halves.”
Max DiLeo led three in double figures as Monmouth hit 29 of 58 shots from the floor, but Iona converted 16 Monmouth turnovers into 24 points.
“It was probably bad coaching on my part to continue to keep running with them,” Rice said. “But that’s who we are. Today, our kids fought hard enough to win a normal game. Every time we got it to eight, they made another three.”
Casimir swiped a game-high four steals as the Gaels tallied 16 fast-break points.
“I thought we stayed in attack mode,” Cluess said. “Good defense to us sometimes means getting teams to play at our pace. We do take chances at times. Tonight, we decided to make chances to get the pace of the game going the way we wanted it. Our guys did a great job of that. To me that’s a lot of fun to watch.”
Iona’s defense limited Justin Robinson. Monmouth’s sophomore point guard came in averaging 13.5 per game.
“Coach Cluess was not going to let us run our offense today,” Rice said. “He trapped Justin. We threw it away. We threw it to someone and tried to get it back to Justin. They trapped him again. It was a great game plan. I thought that’s what they would do. Thought we were prepared. They were better at it than I thought they would be.”
Getting penetration into the paint, Robinson scored 16 in Saturday’s victory over Canisius. Sunday he was forced to take seven shots behind the arc and hit three of five inside the stripe.
“I think our guys did a great job on Justin Robinson, and we didn’t let him dictate the pace of the game for Monmouth,” Cluess explained. “Because of that we were able to cause some turnovers and use the turnovers and attack out of them. I thought we stayed in attack mode.”
MAAC Player of the Year, David Laury, scored just seven points on one of eight shooting, but Iona’s 6-9 forward handed out six assists.
“I thought Dave did a really good job in the second half,” Cluess stated. “I thought in the first half he was a little bit off his game. In the second half, he made some really good passes to get guys shots. It’s great to have him as a facilitator in their middle of their defense.”
The nine threes by Williams broke the previous mark of eight set 13 by Rider’s Jerry Johnson. The Gaels broke the record of 16 treys set by La Salle 25 years ago.
The trip to Monday’s final will be the fourth in five years under Cluess.
Iona sprinted to its first double-digit lead of the game midway through the first half. After hitting 5 of 7 from long range as a team, Jeylani Dublin attacked the boards and grabbed a pair of offensive rebounds. English followed with a catch-and-shoot three-pointer when Laury fed him from the foul line.
Iona led 25-15.
Monmouth responded.
Deon Jones knocked down a jumper.Brice Kofane hit a jump hook in the lane. A DiLeo catch-and-shoot three made it a two-point game at 27-25.
Iona will face Manhattan in a rematch of last year’s finals which the Jaspers won, 71-68. The game will be broadcast live on ESPN2.
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