The Oberlin men’s basketball team has been busy since the season began Nov. 21. The Yeomen have racked up three wins and two losses, reigning victorious over Heidelberg, Notre Dame College and Manchester while falling to John Jay and Baldwin-Wallace.

The winning record was a good omen for a team picked to finish seventh in the NCAC.

“I am very optimistic about this season,” junior Anthony Richardson, who is playing his first season for Oberlin, said. “Oberlin College finally has a group of guys who really want to win and will do whatever it takes to win.”

The Yeomen also managed to pull off a respectable 78-73 win against Heidelberg in the Nov. 21 Coaches vs. Cancer tournament.

However, the Yeomen were in for a little scare when Heidelberg closed the gap to 73-70 with 40 seconds remaining. Senior guard Cameron Leverett kept the team on top in the final seconds by hitting five of six free throws to provide the five-point margin of victory.

“We played the host team on opening night, which made it a very big win,” head coach Frank “Happy” Dobbs said. “We beat the host team in their own tournament.”

The next day, the Yeomen were not so fortunate, losing 66-52 to John Jay College (NY) in the tournament championship.

The Yeomen never secured the lead and went into the locker room at halftime trailing 35-23. Although the team got a total of 15 points from senior Chris Ikpoh, who was selected for the all-tournament team, and 11 from first-year Alex Malone, it was not enough to defeat John Jay.

“It was disappointing that we didn’t win the trophy,” junior Steven Reid said. “They were one of the most athletic teams that we will play this year. They were very motivated and relentless. We didn’t play defense like we know how and got ourselves into a hole that we just couldn’t get out of.”

However, the next two games proved more successful for the Yeomen. In their Nov. 25 home opener against Notre DameCollege, the team managed a 77-74 win, an impressive 15-point turnaround over last year’s 74-62 loss to the Falcons.

Oberlin performed well offensively against Notre Dame, shooting 54 percent from the field and 50 percent from the three-point line.

The Yeomen held on to the lead through both periods, turning a 36-31 halftime lead into a 77-74 win.

“It was our best offensive balance of the season,” Dobbs said.
Six players scored in double digits. Ikpoh led the team with 17 points, Richardson, senior Julius Hill, and first-year Chris Williams each scored 11 points and Leverett and senior Bosko Tomasevic added 10 apiece.

On Nov. 29 the Yeomen took on Manchester College, a team to whom they lost by nearly 40 points last season. However, the tables turned this year as the Yeomen upended Manchester with a score of 79-75.

“They had a lot of returning players and a lot of them were even bigger than last year,” Dobbs said. “Not only did we play a team that was bigger and better than they were before, it was a test for us to redeem ourselves.”

The Yeomen led throughout the entire game and even managed to rack up a 17-point lead with 9:07 left on the clock at 67-50 a lead Manchester couldn’t quite overcome.
High scorers of the night were Ikpoh with 18 points and Richardson with 17 points.

“Manchester is an excellent team,” junior Ronnie Goins said. “Manchester is a team of great shooters so even if they’re down by a lot they have the ability to come back anytime.”

But Oberlin couldn’t sustain the intensity against Baldwin-Wallace, who downed Oberlin 75-66.

“We didn’t come out ready to play,” Tomasevic said.

The Yeomen never grabbed the lead and went into the second half down 39-23. Though the team eventually cut the lead down to seven points, shooting the season’s highest percentage of 63 percent, they did not manage to surmount the deficit.

“If we had come out with the same type of intensity in the first half as we did in the second half, the game may have taken a different turn,” Dobbs said. “We know that you have to play two halves to win a game like this.”

The Yeomen will next take the court against Earlham College tomorrow in Richmond, Indiana.

According to Reid, the Yeomen are expecting a “good team challenge.”