Fayette men win record-breaking consolation game

By Mike Ciarochi

Herald-Standard

Most consolation games, simply by definition, aren't worth the effort.

Of course, there are exceptions, like Friday's USCAA Men's Division II consolation game that saw Penn State Fayette, The Eberly Campus beat Central Penn College, 124-119.

No, there wasn't a trophy for the winners and both teams knew that coming in. They knew their last chance to raise a National Championship trophy had left the building the night before with quarterfinal losses.

But, that didn't keep these teams from putting on a record-breaking show for the fans that made it to the Maltho for the 10 a.m. start. The USCAA record for most points by one team in a game was 109, but these teams both passed that mark by at least 10 points.

"Consolation games are never fun," Central Penn coach Dave Baker said. "They are character games. It takes a lot to get these kids to come out and compete."

And when you get them to compete, you find yourself offering regrets, like Fayette coach Mookie John.

"I wish we had that kind of offense last night," John said, referring to a 77-74 loss to Berkeley in Thursday's quarterfinals. "But, for these guys to come in here and do this is amazing. After how tough that loss was to take, we had to come back and play this game ... at 10 o'clock in the morning.

"That stuff didn't matter to these guys because they had been through so much together. They came together no matter what."

In fact, the Fayette team "came together" with the Central Penn team and, by the time all of the records had been broken, players from both teams were congratulating each other for good games and outstanding careers.

Fayette's Matt McKenna scored his 1,000th point in only his third semester at Fayette and finished his career here with 1,037. McKenna played in 42 games and averaged 24.7 points.

He led Fayette with 38 points and 18 rebounds. Jacob Bronder followed with a career high 27 points, Luke Williams scored 19, C.J. Gaddis added 16 points and nine assists, and Dierre Jenkins scored 13.

It was the last game in a Fayette uniform for McKenna, Bronder and Jenkins, as it was for Central Penn's lone senior Devon Dorsey, who almost pulled off a triple double with 27 points, 12 rebounds and eight assists. Tyre Tucker followed with 27 points and Dominique Twiggs scored 17, while Andre Batte had a game-high 11 assists.

Other statistical highlights were just as mind boggling. The teams combined to launch 174 shots and both teams shot better than 50 percent from the field. Fayette made 53.1 percent of its 81 attempts and Central Penn made 50.0 percent of its 93 shots.

Fayette took a 62-57 halftime lead by shooting 58.5 percent from the field, while Central Penn stayed in the game by building a 30-13 rebounding edge, including 19-6 on the offensive end.

Through it all, neither team built a double-digit lead. Central Penn's largest lead was nine midway through the second half and Fayette's biggest bulge was six in the last minute.