Tribe Rally Falls Short in CAA Opener at VCU

David Schneider led the W&M charge with 15 points, while Laimis Kisielius and Danny Sumner added 13 each.

12/05/07 11:15PM

Richmond, Va. - The William and Mary men’s basketball team dropped its Colonial Athletic Association opener on the road at defending league champion Virginia Commonwealth, 71-57, on Wednesday night. The College could not dig itself out of a 13-point halftime deficit, despite pulling within six points with seven minutes remaining in the contest. The Tribe fell to 1-5 on the year, while VCU, who just knocked off ACC foe Maryland, 85-76, on Sunday, improved to 5-3.

Sophomore guard David Schneider led a trio of Tribe players in double figures with 15 points, while senior Laimis Kisielius and sophomore Danny Sumner added 13 apiece. Schneider finished with a team-high four assists compared to just one turnover, while Sumner led the squad with six rebounds.

The contest was a back-and-forth affair through the opening 12 minutes of play. Following a VCU driving lay-up on the opening possession, the Tribe took its first lead of the contest with five straight points. Schneider canned a three from the right wing, before junior forward Chris Darnell added a hook in the lane to give W&M a 5-2 advantage just 1:30 into the contest.

With the Tribe up 9-6, VCU scored five straight to retake the lead, 11-9, following a T.J. Gwynn 3-pointer from the right wing. Sumner answered right back for the College, scoring four straight points, including a steal and fast-break lay-up before the under 12 minute media timeout and a offensive putback out of the break.

With the contest tied at 17 apiece, preseason CAA Player of the Year Eric Maynor took over for the Rams, scoring seven straight points to give the home team a 24-17 cushion at the 5:51 mark. Maynor drilled a 3-pointer from the left corner, before closing the run with a pair of fast-break lay-ups off W&M turnovers. The Ram lead ballooned to 13, 36-23, at the final horn as Maynor dropped in a floater with three seconds remaining in the first half.

The VCU lead reached as many as 18 in the opening minutes of the second half, but the Tribe would not go quietly as it methodically clawed back into the contest. Following a Larry Sanders’ offensive putback at the 14:17 mark that pushed the Ram advantage to 51-33, W&M used a 12-2 run to get within single digits. Sumner scored the opening two buckets of the run, before Kisielius drained a 3-pointer from the right wing to make it 51-40 with 12:24 to play.

After a Jamal Shuler bucket, W&M scored 10 of the game’s next 13 points to close to within 56-50 at the 6:50 mark. Sumner answered Shuler’s score with an acrobatic driving lay-up, before Kisielius knocked down his second 3-pointer of the sequence. Sumner answer Joey Rodriguez’s trey with one of his own from the left wing with 7:39 remaining. A diving lay-up with the shot clock running down by Nathan Mann cut the deficit to six with under seven minutes to play.

Out of the under eight-minute media timeout, the Rams went on a 9-1 run to put the game away. Shuler, who finished with a game-high 21 points, scored five points on the run, including an alley-oop bucket from Maynor that pushed the Ram lead back to double-digits for the final time in the ball game. W&M could get no closer than 10 the rest of the way as a pair of David Schneider free throws closed the gap to 67-57 with 1:29 remaining, before VCU scored the final four points of the contest.

The Tribe outrebounded its third straight opponent, holding a 34-31 advantage over the Rams on the glass. Along Sumner’s team-high six, Darnell and Schneider finished with five rebounds apiece. W&M knocked down seven 3-point field goals and finished with 15 assists on the evening.

W&M will wrap up its difficult season-opening slate when it travels to Jacksonville, Fla., to face North Florida on Friday, Dec. 7. Tip-off is slated for 7 p.m. at UNF Arena. It will be the Tribe’s second game in a three-day stretch, and will conclude an opening to the season that has comprised six road games in the first seven contests. Jay Colley will have the call on the Tribe Radio Network. The contest can also be heard live over the Internet at TribeAthletics.com.

Box Score