Penguins Fall to Cleveland State, 99-94, in Double OT

[IAA Fan]

Five players reached double figures in scoring led by senior Jaylen Benton's 21 but the Youngstown State men's basketball team dropped a 99-94 decision in double overtime to Cleveland State on Saturday at the Beeghly Center.

The Penguins finish the regular season with an 8-23 overall record and a 6-12 mark in the Horizon Leauge. Cleveland State improves to 9-22 overall and 6-12 in the league.

Benton led the Penguins, who made 12 3-pointers, connected on 8-of-16 shooting from the floor, including a career-best five. Senior Cameron Morse scored all 20 of his points after halftime and became the sixth player in school history to score 1,900 career points. Junior Devin Haygood just missed a double with 16 points and nine rebounds,  sophomore Braun Hartfield scored 12 points and freshman Garrett Covington added 10 points.

Leading Cleveland State was Bobby Word who scored a game-high 25 points and made seven 3-pointers.

The game featured 25 lead changes and 20 ties and neither team lead by more than five points.

Youngstown State led by five, 72-67, after Morse drained a 3-pointer with 1:27 left in regulation. Word answered with a 3-pointer to get the Vikings within two, 72-70. Morse hit another 3-pointer with 26 seconds left to give the Penguins a five-point cushion, 75-70. Word, though, answered again with another 3-pointer with 22 seconds left and Tyree Appleby made a layup with eight seconds left to tie the game and force overtime.

In the first overtime, Morse hit his third 3-pointer of the game with 52 seconds left to give the Penguins an 87-84 advantage. CSU's Stefan Kenic forced the second overtime with a 3-pointer with seven seconds left. Morse's last second game-winning attempt was shot.

The Vikings never trailed in the second overtime period and outscored the Penguins 8-3 after the scored was tied at 91-91 with 3:02 left.

In the first half, the Penguins shot 44.8 percent from the floor and made six 3-pointers to hold a 37-33 edge at the intermission. YSU also forced the Vikings into nine turnovers in the first half and turned those miscues into 11 points.

Benton led the Penguins in the first half with 11 points connecting on 4-of-6 from the floor and draining three 3-pointers.

The Penguins and Vikings battled through six lead changes and four ties before the Penguins scored the final six points of the half on 3-pointers by Benton and Braun Hartfifeld.

Neither team led by more than five points with the Penguins holding a 27-22 advantage with 6:52 left before intermission.

The Penguins will play in the Little Caesar's Horizon League Championship, March 2-6, in Detroit, Mich.

[YSUFANSINCE1990]

  Some on here take offense to this, but, having success as the YSU basketball coach is one of the hardest jobs in the county.  The program has little or no tradition, other than on than at a lower level almost 50 years ago.  The local recruiting base is weak, kids in Akron and Kent area who can play would prefer the MAC over us.  Beeghly Center is a below average arena.

 The Horizon League is ranked among the weakest in D-1, yet, YSU finishes 9th, and loses 23 games overall.  I have no issue with Coach Calhoun, but what can he do that Peters, Robic, and Slocum couldn't?

[ytownchief22]

  Some on here take offense to this, but, having success as the YSU basketball coach is one of the hardest jobs in the county.  The program has little or no tradition, other than on than at a lower level almost 50 years ago.  The local recruiting base is weak, kids in Akron and Kent area who can play would prefer the MAC over us.  Beeghly Center is a below average arena.

 The Horizon League is ranked among the weakest in D-1, yet, YSU finishes 9th, and loses 23 games overall.  I have no issue with Coach Calhoun, but what can he do that Peters, Robic, and Slocum couldn't?

Patience. We've been a dormant program for decades. Turnaround isn't gonna happen overnight.

[go guins]

  Some on here take offense to this, but, having success as the YSU basketball coach is one of the hardest jobs in the county.  The program has little or no tradition, other than on than at a lower level almost 50 years ago.  The local recruiting base is weak, kids in Akron and Kent area who can play would prefer the MAC over us.  Beeghly Center is a below average arena.

 The Horizon League is ranked among the weakest in D-1, yet, YSU finishes 9th, and loses 23 games overall.  I have no issue with Coach Calhoun, but what can he do that Peters, Robic, and Slocum couldn't?

Enthusiasm, coaching, player development and recruiting to start with!  After what is undeniably a very disappointing year, I see progress everywhere.  IF we get Francisco back next season, I look for 50-50 next year and this year's record, but in reverse in 2 years. IF we have to play with a freshman point guard next year, the plan gets moved back a year, but still the same results expected. 
You are certainly right about Beeghly, but that's what all the "money games" were for this year.  Calhoun is trying to replace seats!   Both Beeghly and Stambaugh need upgrades, but I'm sure Strollo will but on it! (kidding of course, RS has had 20 years and done just about -0- without Tressel)

[mudclods]

A disappointing loss that summed up the season.  To get to the line 27 times and make only 12 shots is just unacceptable.  To shoot 24 more shots against a team like Cleveland State at home on Senior Night with a great crowd and to lose is just hard to fathom.   

Even though there were a lot of bad losses in non-conference play, after the 3-0 start in league play I was hopeful.  There was a lot of energy and the guys were playing hard and with a lot of emotion.  The league was down this year & I thought we had the opportunity to battle for the 4-6 seeds.

I really never thought YSU would go 3-12 over the next 15 losing to Detroit twice and CSU at home and end up at the 9 seed.  I go back to that first Detroit game when we were sitting at 3-1 and somehow managed to lose then lost a tough game to Wright State that was there for the taking.  It just seemed like after that point something was lost. 

I think we do comeback and beat CSU Friday, but the game against NKU will be a tall task.     

Hopefully the guys coming back next year can improve and we can get some scorers and guys that can knock down FT.  I like what we have in Covington and Naz.  Naz is a beast rebounding, but really struggled finishing plays off inside and shooting the ball.  Covington plays so hard & seems to be very intelligent.  Braun is just so inconsistent.  There's games he can look tremendous then just not even be a factor the next.  He seemed to really struggle down the stretch.  Hopefully Tyree can get his stamina up and can give us more mins next year.  At times he looks unstoppable.  Would like to see Devin be a little more consistent and improve finishing plays and his FT shooting.     

[IAA Fan]

Calhoun's job is to put butts in those seats ...nothing else. There is a new assistant for that and they need to get to work. Calhoun is not administration & I feel that seats mean nothing. "Build it and they will come" is only a movie. Fans are not going to show up for even an above .500 season. Calhoun has to focus on league and stay at the top ...then fans may catch wind when they start seeing headlines that mention the Guins are in 1st-place, with some reminders that we are in an auto-bid conference. Also with the weakness of the conference now (loss of anyone even remotely good), Strollo needs to heavily petition the league to make the auto-bid be the regular-season champ, no longer the tourney champ. We are no longer a 2-bid conference, so unless the NCAA is going to guarantee us 2-bids (minimum) then having the tourney champs advance makes no sense.

[ucfpengbuck]

Like every one said,tough loss in 2 ot to csu.   Needed to close them out along with Detroit but it didn't happen.  Hopefully the guys can get fired up for the tournament.

Next year the starting point guard will be Devin Morgan who averaged 14 ppg at Delaware State unless a HEALTHY Santiago comes back and they're on the floor together.   Naz needs to work on how he can be effective at this level on scoring.   We all know that he'a a bad man on the boards .  He needs to get confident with his 15 18 ft jumper.   Hartfield has a nice skill set but he needs to get some muscle on that frame to be more effective.
Coach is building a foundation and a couple of good recruiting classes then we won't hear about our facilities or lack of talent in the valley.   We got the right man at the right place and he wants to win more than any of us.

[ucfpengbuck]

Antwan Maxwell, Jr.(JUCO)(RS)
Jordan Oakley(JUCO)
ShanQuan Hemphill(JUCO)
Canberk Kuş

These are 4 JC forwards that YSU has offered.  6'5" to 6'7" range.  I would like to see a bigger space eater type like every school wants.  Got to trust in coach.