SPARKILL, N.Y. - Top-seeded St. Thomas Aquinas College outscored second-seeded Daemen College 17-6 over the final six minutes to secure a 59-48 victory in the championship game of the 2022 East Coast Conference Men's Basketball Tournament today at Aquinas Hall on the campus of St. Thomas Aquinas.

STAC, which has now won six of the last seven ECC Tournament titles, improved to 26-4 and claimed the ECC's automatic bid to the 64-team National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division II Tournament. Daemen dropped to 20-9 and now must hope for an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. The entire NCAA Tournament field will be unveiled tonight at 10:30 p.m.

Daemen is the defending NCAA Division II East Region champion and is looking to make its fourth-straight appearance in the NCAA Tournament. Daemen's chances for the one of the five at-large bids in the NCAA Tournament East Regional took a big blow earlier today when Felician University claimed an automatic bid after upsetting top-seeded Dominican College in the Central Atlantic Collegiate Conference Tournament championship game.

If the Wildcats are not awarded a bid to the national tournament it would mean that the outstanding career of Andrew Sischo (Guilderland, N.Y.) has come to an end. Over the past five seasons he played in 133 of a possible 137 games (116 starts) and led the Wildcats to a 100-37 record, one ECC regular-season title, three NCAA Tournament appearances and its first-ever NCAA Regional championship. A two-time consensus All-American, Sischo was named ECC Player of the Year for an unprecedented fourth-straight season earlier this week and is also the only player in ECC history to be named first-team All-ECC five times. He recently became only the 18th player in NCAA Division II history to reach 2,800 career points. He is currently the active leader in career points (2,888), rebounds (1,478) and double-doubles (84) across all NCAA divisions. He is the all-time leading scorer and rebounder in Daemen and ECC history, as well as the all-time leading scorer among all NCAA men's basketball programs in the state of New York. He ranks 15th in career points and fourth in career rebounds all-time in Division II.

A low scoring first half saw the game tied at 14-14 with just under seven minutes to play in the first half. The Spartans then went on a 12-2 run and opened up a double-digit lead, 26-16, after sophomore Luis Risquez scored with 2:17 left before intermission. Daemen scored the next five points and the Spartans eventually took a 28-21 lead into halftime.

Daemen outscored the Spartans 14-4 over the first seven minutes of the second half. Sischo scored nine points during the run and his conventional three-point play capped the spurt and gave the visitors a 35-32 lead. Both teams struggled to score over the next seven minutes and the game was tied at 42-42 when a jumper by senior Grant Singleton sparked the hosts on a decisive 12-0 run. A jumper by senior Osbel Caraballo with 2:25 to play capped the run and gave the Spartans a 54-42 lead.
 

IMPACT PLAYERS

• Tournament Most Outstanding Player Demetre Roberts paced the Spartans with 20 points, seven rebounds and four assists. Caraballo, who was named to the all-tournament team added 13 points.
• Sischo, who was named to the all-tournament team, was the only player to score in double figures for Daemen. He played 35 minutes, connected on 11-of-18 shots and totaled 24 points, 13 rebounds and three blocks en route to his Division II leading 24th double-double of the year. He has scored 10+ points in 93 of his last 94 games and in 125 games total for his career.
• Junior Nick MacDonald (Amherst, N.Y.) added seven points, while graduate student Sean Fasoyiro (Houston, Tex.) added six points, five rebounds, and three assists.
• Junior Ryan Salzberg (Manlius, N.Y.), who totaled eight points, a career-high 10 rebounds and three assists in a semifinal win over Molloy College Saturday, added five points, seven rebounds and three assists today. He was named to the all-tournament team.

GAME NOTES

• Daemen returns 11 players, including all five starters, from their 2020-21 team that won the NCAA Division II East Region Championship and advanced to the Elite Eight.
• Daemen entered the game ranked eighth in this week's NCAA Division II East Region poll.
• STAC has now prevailed in four of the last six meetings between the two rivals. The Spartans owns an 18-9 advantage in the all-time series. STAC has now eliminated the Wildcats from the ECC Tournament in six of the last seven seasons.
• Daemen shot a season-low 33-percent (19-for-57)  from the field overall and went just 1-for-19 from three-point range. Daemen entered the game shooting 47-percent from the field on the year and had shot at least 45% from the field in 19 of its previous 28 games.
• STAC finished just 23-for-60 from the field (38%) overall and just 4-for-18 from downtown.
• STAC held a 14-2 edge in points off turnovers and a 21-6 advantage in bench points.
• Fasoyiro scored his 1,000th career point during a recent win over D'Youville. He totaled 494 points during his three seasons at Franklin Pierce and has netted 589 points in 45 games at Daemen (13.1 ppg). Daemen is now 30-15 with Fasoyiro in the starting lineup.
• Daemen has won at least 20 games eight times over the past 11 seasons—and 14 times over the last 23 seasons.

NEXT JUMP BALL

The 64-team field of the NCAA Division II Tournament will be revealed tonight (March 6) at 10:30 p.m. on NCAA.com. The eight-team East Regional will take place at a site to be determined next weekend. The regional champion will advance to the NCAA Division II Men's Basketball Elite Eight in Evansville, Indiana, from March 22-26.

Daemen College features the premier NCAA Division II athletics program in the Buffalo-Niagara region, sponsoring 18 intercollegiate teams. For the latest information on Daemen Athletics, follow the Wildcats via social media on Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Instagram, or sign up to receive customizable news alerts, e-mail newsletters and weekly schedule alerts.

Follow the Daemen College men's basketball program on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram at @DaemenMBB.