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When visiting American International College shot its way to the early seven-point lead, there was no sense of panic from the veteran group of starters for the University of New Haven men's basketball team.
The fourth-seeded Chargers didn't change up the defense they were playing, but they did start to limit the open looks and that was more than enough as New Haven rolled to the 69-51 victory to open up play in the Northeast-10 Conference tournament on Friday at Charger Gymnasium.
AIC made five of its first six shots from 3-point range and when Buka Peikrishvili sandwiched 3-pointers around a basket by New Haven's Justin Hendrick (Valley Stream, N.Y./St. Francis), AIC led 21-14.
The Yellow Jackets wouldn't make another 3-pointer for the rest of the half.
Davontrey Thomas (Poughkeepsie, N.Y./Poughkeepsie) had eight points, including a buzzer-beating 3-pointer as the Chargers ended the first half on a 20-4 run to take a 34-25 lead at halftime.
"We didn't make any adjustments, we were there and they made shots, which happens this time of the year when you are excited to play in the postseason," New Haven coach Ted Hotaling said. "I don't think we did anything differently, we just kind of weathered the storm."
New Haven finished with more 3-pointers than AIC did, thanks to connecting on 7 of 12 shots from distance in the second half. Thomas had five of the 3-pointers while Ty Perry (Boston, Mass./Brighton) had all three of his 3-pointers in the second half.
None of the shots were as important as the one by Thomas just before the first half ended. Thomas started the play with a blocked shot and then he took the feed from Victor Olawoye (Elmont, N.Y./Elmont Memorial High School) before burying the open shot to put the Chargers up by nine points at the break.
"Thanks to Vic finding me in the corner, but it is short-term memory and [focus on the] next play, keep doing what you are doing," Thomas said.
Thomas and Quashawn Lane (Trenton, N.J./Trenton Catholic Academy) had back-to-back 3-pointers early in the second half to go up by double digits for the first time. Perry hit all of his 3-pointers to extend the lead to 20.
"I would definitely like to shout out our coaches for that because our coaches, they kept us level-headed," Perry said. "They came out and hit five 3s so our coaches said, it is OK, it is basketball and they are going to hit 3s so stay level-headed and make sure our defense is on point and that is what we did."
Perry led New Haven with 19 points, Thomas finished with 17 points while Olawoye had six of New Haven's 17 assists.
Jason Edokpayi (Laurel, Md./Mount St. Joseph) and Justin Hendrick (Valley Stream, N.Y./St. Francis) came off the bench and played a key role in helping New Haven turn things around in the first half.
Edokpayi had seven points and six rebounds in 22 minutes while Hendrick had five huge points in the first half for the Chargers (18-9).
"Justin and Jason played big-time minutes and credit to them to come in, locked in and be ready to play," Thomas said.
Justice Ellison had 16 points and Jalen Jordan added 11 for AIC (5-24). The Yellow Jackets only attempted five 3-pointers in the second half and missed 12 of their last 15 3-point attempts.
New Haven will be back at Charger Gymnasium to face rival Southern Connecticut in the NE10 quarterfinals on Sunday at 3 p.m.
The Owls put up 49 points in the first half on the way to the 85-71 win over Saint Rose.
"Playing Southern is always a good game so I am looking forward to it," Thomas said. They are a well-coached team, a very good team from top to bottom and it will be a fun, high [pressure] game."
