Columbia
Yale
Men's Basketball Holds Off Yale, 56-50, Earning First Road Weekend Sweep Since 2008
2/21/2015 10:10:00 PM | Men's Basketball
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NEW HAVEN, Conn. – The Columbia men's basketball team earned its first victory at Yale since 2008 after a 56-50 victory over the Bulldogs Saturday night. The Lions moved to 13-11 overall and 5-5 in Ivy League play.
Junior Maodo Lo scored a game-high 18 points. Cory Osetkowski added 10 points and Isaac Cohen pulled down nine rebounds.
Columbia held Yale's (19-8, 8-2) top scorer Justin Sears to seven points on 3-of-8 shooting.
The first half featured a series of runs by both teams and ended with Columbia holding a 30-22 lead at halftime. The Lions started the game on a 14-4 spurt punctuated by a Lo rejection and Isaac Cohen layup in transition with 15:18 on the clock.
The Bulldogs responded with the next 10 points over approximately the next six minutes. Cohen halted the rally with a put-back to start a 12-0 spurt to give Columbia a 26-14 advantage with 5:03 on the clock.
However, the Lions were held to just one field goal the rest of the frame to make it an eight-point game.
Columbia scored the first seven points of the second half and took its largest lead of the game, 42-26, after a Kyle Castlin jumper with 15:42 remaining.
From there, the Lions went cold offensively, going scoreless over the next seven-plus minutes, but Yale was only able to pull within 10 points during that stretch. Lo ended the drought with a step-back jumper to make it 44-32 at the 8:12 mark before the Bulldogs made one final push.
Yale rattled seven in a row to make it a one possession game, 44-41, with 5:03 showing on the scoreboard. Columbia dug in and came up with a pair of stops and Luke Petrasek buried an open trey from the left corner to stop the bleeding with 3:10 to go.
The Lions knocked down 6-of-7 from the charity stripe over the next two minutes to build the lead back up to, 54-44, with just 36 seconds left. Despite a pair of triples from the Bulldogs, Columbia iced the game by breaking Yale's full-court pressure and getting a dunk by Castlin with seven seconds remaining.
The Lions held a 39-30 edge on the boards against the top rebounding team in the Ivy League.
Javier Duren led the Bulldogs with 13 points and five assists.
Columbia returns home for its final home weekend when they take on Dartmouth on Friday, February 27 at 8 p.m. Tickets are still available and can be purchased by clicking here. The game will broadcast by the American Sports Network and on SNY in the New York City area. Fans can also stream live video and audio on the Ivy League Digital Network.
Game notes: The Lions earned its first road sweep since topping Dartmouth and Harvard on Feb. 14-15, 2008… It was Columbia's first road sweep of Brown and Yale since Feb. 25-26, 2000… Lo moved up to 19th on the all-time scoring list and now has 1,050 career points.
