GUELPH, ON – After controlling play for much of the game on Saturday night, in what was the final home opener at the W.F. Mitchell Centre, the Gryphons men's basketball team saw Queen's erase a seven-point fourth quarter deficit as the Gaels escaped Guelph with a 77-74 win. Both teams now sit at 1-1 on the season.
Guelph led by as many as nine points on two occasions in the third quarter. But the tenacious Gaels refused to fold, and took the lead for good on a basket by Jesse Graham with 18 seconds left in regulation.
The Gryphs were unable to respond, and Graham added a late free throw to end the scoring.
"We gave up a lot of offensive rebounds in the second half, which gave them too many second-chance points, and we had some defensive lapses that just killed us," Gryphs head coach
Chris O'Rourke said.
He said he saw an improvement over last weekend's season opener, which Guelph won 83-81 over Western, but there's still plenty of work to do on defence.
"It was better for a longer period of time, but it's still not good enough, where we need it to be. We did a lot of good things, but in the end we also bit ourselves.
"Offence was up and down. We were missing free throws, and we had chances when we were up to extend the lead back to six or seven, but we didn't finish the plays. That certainly hurt us. But at the defensive end, the inconsistency there bit us big time."
"We controlled the game for most of the time. We just got sloppy," agreed Gryphs top scorer
Ahmed Haroon. "We took some possessions off on defence, and we didn't finish the job.
"We've got to watch the film and figure out exactly what went wrong, and improve on it."
Down two points with 18 seconds left, the Gryphs got the ball to Haroon under the Queen's basket, but he was unable to make the play that would have tied the contest.
Despite that, the fourth-year forward from Mississauga was a force all night, scoring a game-high 25 points and grabbing nine rebounds, including seven defensive boards.
"That was probably the best game he's played as a Gryphon," O'Rourke said.
Daniel Dooley scored 12 points for Guelph while fellow fourth-year guard
Taylor Boers added 10 and rookie guard
Jordan Sobot chipped in with eight. Third-year forward
Kingslee D'Silva grabbed seven rebounds.
Four Gaels reached double digits in points: Jesse Graham with 18, Sammy Ayisi with 17, Richard Iheadindu with 14 and Sukhpreet Singh with 12. Tanner Graham led all players with 17 rebounds.
O'Rourke said the team will bounce back from Saturday's loss, which evens the Gryphs' record at 1-1.
"Mentally, we've got to wash it off. We can't get it back now, but we've got to get stronger from it," he said. "We've got to prepare for three games on the road, and it's going to take mental toughness."
The Gryphs didn't think they would play again at the Mitchell Centre, but construction of the new Guelph Gryphons Athletics Centre was not completed in time. It'll be opened in January instead.
There's one more game at the Mitchell Centre, on December 3 against the York Lions. The Gryphs are tentatively set to play in their new home for the first time on January 13 against the Laurier Golden Hawks.
"It was great playing there for four years," Haroon said of the Mitchell Centre, "but I'm definitely ready to move on, and I'm looking forward to the new gym."
