Jan. 5, 2008
NORFOLK, Va. -- Old Dominion dropped its first CAA game of the season at the hands of William & Mary (5-8/1-2) Saturday night, 61-70. ODU drops to 7-8 on the season and 2-1 in the conference. The Monarchs were led by first year small forward Ben Finney with a career-high 17 points and eight rebounds, including six offensive.
The Monarchs never led in the game but the largest deficit was 12 with 15:31 remaining and ODU was within two possessions for much of the second half. However, the Tribe was highly efficient from the charity stripe (73.3% on 22-of-30 shooting) and made key defensive stops down the stretch to halt the Old Dominion home winning streak at three.
William & Mary was led by David Schneider with 24 points on 5-of-7 shooting. Laimis Kisielius and Danny Sumner also were in double figures for the Tribe.
The freshman from Portsmouth, Virginia was a catalyst for the ODU offense for much of the night, especially on the second opportunity. Finney had six offensive rebounds and ODU scored 18 points on second chance opportunities. The career high in points came on 7-of-8 shooting in just 21 minutes of play.
Junior forward Jonathan Adams also had several momentum-swinging jumpers from the outside and finished with 11 points. Gerald Lee and Darius James were also in double figures with 11 and 12 respectively.
William & Mary outshot the Monarchs for the game with a .455 shooting percentage from the field on 20-of-44 attempts while ODU notched a .362 percentage on 21-of-58 shooting. The difference was beyond the arc as the Tribe hit two more three's than the Monarchs on 11 fewer attempts in the game.
The loss drops ODU to a half game back of Delaware for the early-season league lead, in a tie with James Madison, George Mason and VCU.
ODU now hits the road for a two-game conference road swing starting January 9 at Towson with tip set for 7:00 pm.