Saturday's Behrend Tournament Championship contest featured a pair of NCAA Tournament teams from last season in Penn State Behrend and St. Mary's. The Seahawks raced out to a 40-21 halftime lead and went on to capture the Behrend Tournament title with a 69-52 victory.
St. Mary's sprinted to a 13-2 lead to open the face paced game. The Behrend Lions would fight back at the 11:43 mark as Behrend's Drew Seker (Ellicott City, MD/Centennial) hit a three from Tom Newman (Girard/Northwestern) to cut the lead to five. The Seahawks would answer back and go into the break with a 19 point advantage.
Behrend was held to 32 percent from the field on 8 of 25 shooting while St. Mary's hit 17 of 30 for 57%. Behrend's Adam Kaiser (Erie/Cathedral Prep) led the offense with 11 first half points, while the Seahawks were led by Camontae Griffin and Alex Franz who had nine apiece.
In the second half, the Behrend Lions pulled with nine at 4:26, but were outscored 10-2 to close out the game as Behrend evened its mark at 2-2.
Adam Kaiser (Erie/Cathedral Prep) led the Behrend offense with 21 points on 7 of 14 from the floor, while Seker had nine points, eight rebounds and three assists. St. Mary's Camontae Griffin had 15, and Calvin Wise posted 10 points, eight rebounds, and three blocks. Alex Franz also chipped in 12 points, nine boards, and five assists as the Seahawks improved to 2-0.
In the tournament's consolation game, Bethany handled Nazareth 91-82. The Bison were led by Joe Testa's 23-point, 11-rebound effort and Petre Petkovski's 15 markers and seven boards, while the Nazareth was paced by Jeff DeHimer's 19 points and six rebounds and Ryan McAdam's 23 points.
Named to the all-tournament team were DeHimer (NAZ), Petkovski (BET), Seeker (BD), Kaiser (BD), Wise (STM), and the MVP was St. Mary's Camontae Griffin.
Next up for the blue and white will be the conference opener against Mt. Aloysius. The Mounties will travel to Erie, PA, for the 8:00 p.m. AMCC game that will be televised on Image Sports. Last season, these teams split a pair of meetings.
