WESTFIELD – The Westfield State University men’s basketball team secured the No. 1 seed in the 2013 ECAC Division III New England Tournament and hosts No. 8 seed Emerson College in a quarterfinal round game on Wednesday, Feb. 27, at 7:00 p.m.
Westfield enters the postseason tournament with a 21-5 record, the second most victories in school history. The Owls captured their first outright MASCAC regular season championships but were defeated by Fitchburg State University, 68-61, in the MASCAC tournament semi-finals.
Emerson College is 15-11 overall and finished third with a 13-5 record in the 11-team Great Northeast Athletic Conference.
The postseason tournament game also marks a reunion on the hardcourt for Westfield coach Rich Sutter and Emerson second-year head coach Jim O’Brien. Sutter was a student assistant coach at Saint Bonaventure in the early 1980s when O’Brien was the head coach at the Olean, N.Y. University. O’Brien’s 27-year run in the Division I coaching ranks also includes successful stops at Boston College and Ohio State.
Westfield is making its fifth appearance in the ECAC Tournament and its first in four years. The Owls are led by the senior record-setting duo of Lee Vazquez and Matt Devine. Vazquez, an explosive 5-6 guard, ranks 19th nationally in scoring (21.4 ppg) and seventh nationally in steals (3.12). Vazquez is the Owls’ all-time leader in steals and ranks fifth on their career scoring charts with 1,521 points.
Devine leads the NCAA Division III for the second straight year in blocked shots per game (3.46). The imposing 6-7 center is averaging 11.5 points and 9.9 rebounds per game.
Sophomores Grant Cooper (11.3 ppg., 5.7 rpg.) and Jordan Santiago (8.5 ppg.), and senior Ryan White (7.7 ppg., 7.6 rpg.) complete Westfield’s starting lineup. Santiago ranks 21st nationally in steals (2.58), and team-wise the Owls rank seventh nationally in steals per game (15.3) and 13th in field goal defense percentage (.381).
Emerson’s balanced attack is led by freshman guard Michael Thorpe (11.9 ppg.), a third-team all-conference selection. Other top players are Patrick Lowndes (8.9 ppg., 6.5 rpg.) and Jon Goldberg (7.9 ppg., 8.2 rpg.).
The Emerson-Westfield winner plays No. 4 seed Castleton State or No. 5 seed Wentworth in the semi-finals. In other quarterfinal action, No. 2 Anna Maria hosts No. 7 Southern Maine and No. 3 Eastern Connecticut entertains No. 6 Johnson & Wales.
