Dartmouth at Vermont 1/2/2019

Vermont 73 Dartmouth 59

Happy New Year!

Anthony Lamb continued his domination of the Ivy league, leading Vermont to victory over Dartmouth. Along the way Lamb scored the 1,000th point of his career. Lamb finished with 21 points, 14 rebounds, and 6 blocks. The number of blocks actually seems a little low as Lamb completely dominated the paint in the second half. He was a one man wrecking crew protecting the basket and cleaning up the glass. He makes several jaw dropping plays every night. Get to a game. He is a must see player. Isaiah Moll took the holiday break and hit the reset button as he was able to break out of his offensive slump with an 18 point performance. He looked a little calmer on the court and was able to limit the mistakes that were plaguing him before the break. Ben Shungu and Robin Duncan came up big on both ends of the floor as Vermont really clamped down on defense to pull away. The Cats were finally able to get some balanced scoring and big time contributions from their bench. The one concerning trend is the Cats continued struggles from the three point line. They finished a depressing 1-14 from three. That brings them to a 20-94 (21%) clip over their last four games. That is just awful and is significant because the three is a big part of the Vermont offense. They are just not generating enough open looks and when they do they are not knocking them down. It has been great that they have been able to win without the three by relying on their defense but they are going to need to start knocking down shots at some point. Now it is time for conference play. Anything goes during conference play as familiar foes and rivals duke it out every night. The 10 win non-conference is a great accomplishment and this team can feel good about how they battled and the experiences they gained. But now the real season begins. Stony Brook also had a very strong non-conference and looks poised to challenge Vermont for the title. It all starts with the rivalry game on the road against Albany. Crazy things can happen in the conference schedule and Vermont is going to have a target on their back every night. Time to go out and fight for a championship.