When I visited Mount St. Vincent a couple of weeks back, I learned of another Division III school in the Yonkers area, namely Sarah Lawrence College. The college, which turns 100 next year and is officially in Bronxville, was named for the founder's wife, but is a co-educational institution and has a men's basketball team. They play out of Campbell Sports Center, which includes an indoor pool, track, squash courts, and weight rooms along with the gymnasium. It is named for the parents of the chairman of the Board of Trustees when the facility opened in 1998, and I could not find a listed capacity.
Sarah Lawrence is perhaps most famous for the bizarre sex cult that was featured in a Hulu docuseries Stolen Youth. I did not know about that incident until researching this post, but it made for some depressing reading. The college is located about 15 minutes from Fleetwood Station on the Metro-North Railroad (which is only 40 minutes from Grand Central), though I walked over from Yonkers Raceway, about a mile and a half in the chilly night. There are no tickets here and the inner door is locked, though an attendant will let you in. The small lobby has a Hall of Fame, though most of the panels are still blank.
There are also two trophy cases, with the most recent one needing a fix as the Skyline logo has fallen off.
My favourite trophies are the random statistical champions; even at this level they are given out and make for pretty tough trivia questions.
Inside there is a walkway above the wooden benches along one sideline, and spectators are not allowed to walk behind the baskets or to the other side of the court. The last row of the benches has some back support, but it is the form of bars like you see on the side in the below photo and not that comfortable.
This place is so small that there is no room for the broadcaster, who has to stand on the far side and look over the railing to announce the game. He is visible in the photo below.
At halftime, the cheerleaders throw their pom-poms to the first few rows of fans and then create human baskets (below) at which the fans throw the pom-poms, something I had never seen before. There were no prizes for sinking a shot however. Kudos to the cheerleaders who also had to perform at the women's game that took place immediately before.
Another weird thing is that there were no announcements after baskets or fouls. Frankly, the acoustics are not the best anyway, so it didn't make much difference, but again, it was something I had not experienced before. Anyway, that's all you need to know about this place and I am quite sure that not a single reader will visit it anyway. But as I found out tonight, D-III hoops can be entertaining even if the basketball is not the best.
The Game
The Pratt Cannoneers made the trip up from Brooklyn with a 5-2 record, while the Gryphons were 2-4. Despite that, Sarah Lawrence was ranked 342nd (of 408 schools) in efficiency, 20 points higher than Pratt, mostly because Pratt had played some awful teams. Pratt's home gym is the ARC, which I had visited when St. Francis played there in their final season.
The game started nearly 30 minutes late as the women went long, but once it began it was intense and chaotic. Both teams play at a frenetic pace and without the media timeouts, the game can have some long periods without a break. Pratt went up 19-7 early, but three quick triples from the Gryphons got them back in it, and a few minutes later, Eamon Kelly (passing below) drained another while being fouled to give them a 30-27 lead with 2:00 to go. The Cannoneers tied it on a trey from Cameron Hatcher (his only points of the evening), and Kelly then potted a pair of free throws, only for Thomas Graetz to reply with another long ball to give Pratt the 33-32 edge at the half.
The second half saw Kelly and Andrew Kim (dribbling below) combine for the first six points and then we went through a series of lead changes and ties, with the battle knotted at 58 with 5:36 to go. There were 14 fouls in the first ten minutes of the half, but only four infractions in the next nine minutes, which was some of the most entertaining basketball I have seen in a while, as the players went back and forth and the refs let them play.
Kelly drained a three to put Sarah Lawrence up 61-60, but Elijah Fermaint completed a hoop and harm for Pratt to again give them the 63-60 advantage. That lead stretched to 4 after a Trey Phillips (#11 in yellow) layup with 1:50 to go, and then the Gryphons milked the clock, only for Kelly to miss a threeball. Mekhi Davis was fouled on the fastbreak but only made one, and then a Kim layup got Sarah Lawrence within 68-65 with 1:04 to go, still anyone's game.
The difference was interior shooting as Pratt went 21-34 (61.8%) and had 40 points in the paint, while Sarah Lawrence was an abysmal 10-36 (27.8%) for 18 paint points. Amazingly, the Gryphons shot 40.7% from long range, and were 12-14 from the free throw line, while the Cannoneers were just 9-21 from the charity stripe. Such an odd statistical breakdown that certainly had both coaches fuming. Phillips led all scorers with 28 points and added 4 blocks, while Kelly finished with 27 in the loss. A fun game that took about two minutes too long due to another pointless out-of-bounds review late.
Notes
I started the evening at Yonkers Raceway, a harness track behind the Empire City Casino. I could not believe how empty it was; I counted 15 other spectators. Yeah, it was cold and you could gamble in warmth next door, but still, I was surprised at how few people in the NYC area make the trip to see horses.
To be fair, harness racing is not as interesting as thoroughbreds and I only stayed for two races, both of which were won by the favourite. At any rate, this visit does not deserve a post of its own.
I mentioned that the game went just a bit too long, so I missed the 10:30 train out of Fleetwood. But this was not a big problem as there is a Pizza Pizza by the station, though not the Canadian chain with the catchy phone number jingle. Still, they had a Too Good To Go offering of four slices for $5, so I got a box and went to Mazzys Bar to have a beer and wait for the 11:30 train. Mazzys is a typical local hangout and late on Wednesday there were only three regulars, who were a bit surprised to see a stranger with a pizza box pop in. In the end, I gave a couple of slices to one of them and hope he appreciated the gesture as I really didn't want to carry the box on the train. So if you are ever in the area, stop by and support these local businesses.
Below is a picture of Fleetwood Mac.
Next Up
I'm continuing my lower division tour in NYC with a visit to Brooklyn College on Friday night, then an unusual day trip to Florida for the MLS Cup. Check back for recaps next week.
Best,
Sean
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