CHESTER, Pa. – Down by 10 midway through the first half, the Lycoming College men's basketball team turned to its inside game and then in the second half, it opened up its outside game, hitting eight 3-pointers, to help lift it to a 90-77 win over top-seeded Widener University in the semifinals of the MAC Commonwealth Championship at the Schwartz Center on Wednesday night, Feb. 26.
 
"We came out with an attitude that there was no pressure," junior Darius Dangerfield (Abingdon, Md./Harford Tech), who led the Warriors with 25 points, six assists, four rebounds and three steals, said. "We have a younger team that was predicted to finish last in the preseason poll. This was just another chance to go out and prove we're ready to be here. We worked hard to be here so we just played hard."
 
The Warriors move on to face No. 3 Arcadia in the conference final on Saturday, Feb. 29, at 7 p.m., at Alumni Gymnasium in Glenside, Pa. Arcadia beat second-seeded Albright, 93-89, in overtime in the other conference semifinal on Wednesday night.
 
Sophomore Matt Ilodigwe (Wilmington, Del./Concord) posted 16 points, all in the second half, hitting four 3-pointers. All five in the starting lineup finished in double figures, with senior Ryan Hollis (Centreville, Md./Saints Peters & Paul) posting 12 points and both freshmen Dyson Harward (Danville, Pa./Danville Area) and Mo Terry (Severn, Md./Severn School) each had 11.
 
Lycoming shot 51 percent (33-of-65) in the game, including canning nine 3-pointers, eight coming in the second half. Widener shot 54 percent (14-of-26) in the first half before falling to 39 percent (12-of-31) in the second half, as Lycoming outscored the Pride by 17 in the second stanza.
 
"Our style of play allows us to adapt to how teams play us defensively," second-year head coach Mike McGarvey said. "Widener clearly tried to take us away from 3-point shots and they doubled the post, so we had to drive the rim and Darius Dangerfield led us with that. He took 21 shots to get 25 points, but without him driving to the rim, especially in the first half, it would have been a different game."
 
Widener took a 48-43 lead off a fastbreak bucket by Connor Laverty before the Warriors hit three straight 3-pointers, the last coming from Ilodigwe to give Lycoming a 52-51 lead with 14:03 left. After Widener missed a 3-pointer, Terry hit one at the top of the key and Ilodigwe hit a second-chance trey to make it 58-51 with 11:52 left. Widener hit a three to get it back to four points, but Lycoming responded with four straight two-pointers, making it 66-54 with 8:44 left.
 
"Matt is from Wilmington, which is right around the corner, so he was excited for the game," McGarvey said. "We've seen with Matt, over the last two years, that the longer he is on the court, the more time he has to get some shots and when he gets it going, he can really rattle off some points. He also had four rebounds and two steals."
 
Widener was able to pull within single digits just twice more and each time, Hollis hit a 3-pointer in response to ward off any thoughts off a comeback.
 
Widener used seven straight points in a two-minute span to take a 16-9 lead five minutes into the game and stretched that into an 10-point lead at 33-23 with 6:22 left in the half before the Warriors scored five layups in a row, two from Dangerfield, two from Flores-Diaz and the last on a second-chance layup from freshman DeAundre Manuel (Brooklyn, N.Y./KIPP NYC College Prep) gave Lycoming a 35-33 lead with 2:16 left before the break. The Pride closed the half on an 8-2 run, though, to take a four-point lead into the break.
 
"I saw the jitters go away," Dangerfield said of the first-half run. "Once a couple shots went in, we started to relax, play our basketball, forget the crowd was there and get into a rhythm."