Brown Stuns Fordham 69-65 in the Bronx

Saturday, November 13, 2010

Scott Cordischi, GoLocalProv Sports Editor

College basketball teams try to “buy” wins. That’s the way it is in the big business that is division one men’s college basketball. Teams from power conferences often pay a guaranteed amount to programs from lesser conference to come to their gym, get their tails kicked for 40 minutes and then go home. At least, that’s the way it’s supposed to work.

Last night at the Rose Hill Gymnasium on the campus of Fordham University, the Rams invited the Brown Bears to open their season in the Bronx and paid them tens of thousands of dollars to do so. Unfortunately for Fordham, the Bears proved to be unruly guests and walked out of New York with a 69-65 upset.

“Not bad when you get paid a lot of money to come down here and play and you’re able to come out with a win,” said Brown coach Jesse Agel. “This was a great win for our program.”

The Bears controlled the game virtually from start to finish leading by as many as 15 points in the first half. Fordham did make a run at the Bears in the second half, even going ahead by 1, but they were no match a Brown team that worked extremely well together all night long.

To single out one player for Brown as being the key to the victory would be almost impossible as virtually everyone who played had a big part in the win. Senior captains Peter Sullivan (17 pts, 5 reb) and Adrian Williams (8 pts, 2 reb, 2 assists in 9 minutes) both came up big for the Bears.

“I hate to single out one guy because it’s unfair to the rest of the team who played great, but Adrian Williams was huge,” Agel said. “This guy has been hurt. We didn’t even know if he’d be able to play, but when we called on him he went in there and hit a couple of big three’s and never complained once.”

Williams 3’s were huge as Fordham had pulled to within one of Brown who was struggling to put the ball in the basket. Williams came in and did his best impersonation of former Detroit Pistons great Vinnie Johnson providing instant offense off the bench which earned him the nickname “the microwave.”

Sophomores Andrew McCarthy (12 pts, 4 reb) and Tucker Halpern (10 pts, 6 assists) both played well. Halpern’s passing was superb as he seemed to have eyes in the back of his head finding open teammates all night long.

Halpern wasn’t the only one dishing out the assists for Brown. Freshman point guard Sean McGonagill started and played 33 outstanding minutes racking up 9 points, 5 rebounds and 6 assists all while committing 0 turnovers. McGonagill is the first true point guard the program has had in many years and his presence was felt immediately in the first game of his collegiate career.

Chris Gaston, the Atlantic 10’s Rookie of the Year last season, led the Rams with 21 points and 17 rebounds.

Next up for Brown (1-0) is a date with another set of Rams from the A-10. The Rhody Rams (0-1) will host the Bears Tuesday night at 7pm at the Ryan Center in Kingston. URI coach Jim Baron is probably thrilled with Brown’s win as he can now be assured that his team won’t take Brown lightly in their intra state rivalry.