BALTIMORE, Md.--The Hood College men's basketball team (8-4) matched its largest comeback in program history and won its first regular-season tournament championship since the 2007-08 season with a resilient 64-60 triumph over host Johns Hopkins University (7-3) Wednesday evening at Goldfarb Gym.
Hood equaled the remarkable rally from last season at the University of Mary Washington, when the Blazers transformed a 50-33 first-half deficit into a 105-100 overtime win on Feb. 9. The Blazers also took home their first regular-season tournament trophy since capturing the Rinso Marquette Tournament at Lebanon Valley College Nov. 21-22, 2008.
Both teams struggled to find their offensive rhythm to start the contest as neither squad connected on a field goal until Trey Quinn finished a feed from Adrien Straughn nearly five minutes into the game. Hood's scoring woes continued for the remainder of the half as the Blue Jays built their largest lead, a 17-point advantage (21-4), at the 9:09 mark. After hitting just six buckets in the opening 20 minutes, Hood found itself in a 30-16 hole heading into the locker room.
A rejuvenated Hood squad managed to whittle the margin to just four less than three minutes into the second half. Quinn was responsible for seven of Hood's first 12 points of the period. Hood took its first lead of the game since Quinn's initial basket in the first half on a layup by Justin Stone at the 12:10 mark, making it 37-36. The lead seesawed back and forth a bit before a pair of free throws by Quinn regained a lead for Hood it would not surrender (40-39, 10:17 left).
Hopkins did not go quietly however and used a pair of late three-pointers to stay close. Quinn's layup with 2:27 to go in regulation made it a five-point Hood lead, but JHU's Jimmy Hammer buried a deep triple to cut it to two with 1:17 to play. Ramon Smith and Stone converted 4-of-4 from the foul line on Hood's next two trips to make the margin six with 30 seconds left.
Then it is was Daniel Corbett who knocked down the clutch three for Hopkins with just 22 seconds remaining and the hosts immediately called timeout. Hood was unable to inbound the ball following the stoppage and the Blue Jays regained possession under their own basket with 13 ticks left. The Blue Jays decided not to take another timeout following the Blazer miscue and instead looked to Corbett for a second long range shot. Corbett's optential game-tying triple try was off the mark and Quinn came down with the carom and was fouled. With five seconds showing on the clock, Quinn made 1-of-2 from the line to ice the game for the Blazers.
Quinn was selected as the tournament's most valuable player after tallying a game-high 19 points. Smith also represented Hood on the all-tournament team; he netted 12 points in tonight's game and 11 in Tuesday's win over Rutgers-Newark.
The Blazers, now winners of four straight, finished with an impressive 74.3 percentage from the stripe, hitting 26-of-35 attempts on the night. They outscored the Blue Jays 48-30 in the second half, knocking down twice as many field goals as the opening stanza, and got 22 points from the foul line.
Hood looks to carry its momentum into conference play Saturday when it travels to Marymount University for a 4 p.m. tilt with the Saints, who lost to St. Mary's College (Md.) tonight, 81-63. The Blazers haven't won more than five games in a row since the 2006-07 season when they strung together nine straight wins from Dec. 30 - Jan. 27.