Brian Sortino’s Historic Night Leads Oswego State to SUNYAC Championship
Oswego N.Y- The top seeded Oswego State Lakers men’s basketball team outlasted the #5 Buffalo State Bengals in a overtime victory, 84–83. Both sides fought tooth and nail to try and gain an advantage. Brian Sortino just happened to be all the advantage Oswego needed.
Once the second half and overtime came around, he turned it up for Oswego. Sortino poured in 34 points while shooting 66.7% from the field. He also shot 17–19 from the free throw line and finished with nine rebounds and six assists. Jamir Ferebee also supplied 14 points and Ian Schupp hit 4 three-pointers for the Lakers
“Brian is just an incredible player.” Says Oswego State coach Leone “I don’t wanna single him out because it’s a team effort, but he had a look in his eye tonight.”
Brian broke his own career high of 39 points and came one point shy of tying the Oswego State record.
Sortino really started to feel it just under the 12-minute mark where he knocked down two well contested stepback three-pointers followed by a tough layup that brought the Oswego crowd to it’s feet. Sortino became the focal point of the offense and when Oswego had a chance to take the last shot, Buffalo State swarmed Sortino with a triple team. Jamir Ferebee made a heads up play to go to the wide open paint area under the basket and trusted Sortino would find him. Sortino hit him with a pass that led to an easy layup to give Oswego their 84–83 lead and sent the Laker crowd into an uproar.
“It’s awesome when the crowd is jumping up and down like that in the last 10 seconds.” Says Sortino “You get chills.”
The problem for Oswego was that the Bengals were not fazed by the crowd or a man on a mission. The Bengals stayed in this game throughout with timely shooting and stellar defensive pressure. Once the layup was made, it was a one point game and there was still 7 seconds left on the clock. Buffalo State came out of the timeout with a plan. Through speed and good ball movement, the Bengals found a hole in Oswego’s defense that set up and Ryniek Holloway got off a wide open 3 that fell short off the front rim.
On the night, Lovell Smith led the way for the Bengals with 29 points and nine rebounds in a valiant effort that just wasn’t enough in the end. This was the Bengals third loss to the Lakers this season by just one point.
Now the Lakers move on to the championship game tomorrow at 4 p.m. against the #3 Oneonta Red Dragons. On the season, Oswego and Oneonta split the interconference matchup, each team winning one game. This is the third straight SUNYAC championship appearance for Oswego, but the first one on their home court.
“We wanna cut the nets down in front of our fans”
