For Lightning, home is still where the wins are

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Last season, as they were on their way to winning the City University of New York Athletic Conference (CUNYAC) regular season championship, the Lehman Lightning made it a point to make their home court, The Apex, a house of horrors for their opponents. 

That mission was accomplished as the Lightning rolled off an impressive 11-2 record at The Apex last season. So when the Lightning hosted Farmingdale in its home opener last week, it presented Lehman with the opportunity to see if they could keep the good times rolling at home. And thanks to Damian Bellamy and Edwin Pascual, the Lightning did just that as the pair combined for 41 points with Pascual bagging four three-pointers in the contest as Lehman posted a 76-70 victory over Farmingdale before a spirited crowd at The Apex.

The win boosted Lehman’s record to 2-2 on the season.

“It was nice to get back home after being away for the first three games,” said Pascual, whose three-pointer with 17:03 left to play helped Lehman open up a nine-point lead. “We like to take advantage of our home court where we get such great support.”

The game was tightly contested in the first half as the lead switched hands nine times before Lehman managed to take a 36-35 lead into halftime. But it was the Lightning’s 14-5 spurt to open the second half that seemed to put the Lightning in control as Bellamy, Pascual, John Brens and Andrew Utate each contributed to the run.

That’s the formula the Lightning say they will need to follow this season if they are to hope to repeat as CUNYAC champions - balanced scoring and contributions from everyone.

“This year we have a lot of pieces, multiple guys who can score in double digits,” said Pascual. Who finished with 20 points, five rebounds and a pair of assists. “That’s really good for nights when one of us is off, the other three guys can go off and help us out.”

Double figures

On the night Lehman boasted three players in double figures, with Utate adding 15 points to join Pascual and Bellamy, while John Brens added eight points with five assists.

The Lightning seemingly had things in control as they extended their lead to 52-40 with 14:15 to play after Utate knocked down a jumper. But the Achilles heel for Lehman so far this season has been its inability to put teams away while suffering through defensive lapses. That’s what turned a 10-point lead vs. Vassar College into a four-point loss earlier this season and looked like it might bite the Lightning again vs. Farmingdale as the Rams pulled within 66-63 with 5:11 to play after three-pointer by Trey Kinard.

“I was very nervous, because at Vassar, we had a 10-point lead and it was starting to feel exactly the same way,” Lehman head coach Steve Schulman said. “But we had that home energy this time and that helped make the difference.”

Lehman did bend, but it didn’t break and a layup by Pascual followed by a pair of free throws by Bellamy boosted the Lehman lead back to seven points at 70-63 and with 1:31 to play and Farmingdale never got closer than six points the rest of the way.

 “We’re getting there but that’s what we’re going to continue to work on in practice, defense, so that next time we can get out of situations like that a little easier,” Pascual said. “But we’re getting there little by little.”

Defense, defense, defense

Defense is what Schulman said he will stress in practices until he sees it translate into game action.

“We still really have a long way to go,” Schulman said. “Basically we’re just outscoring people more than we’re stopping them. [Against Farmingdale], we just played a lot of zone and we’d just say, ‘Look, you shoot it and we’ll shoot it but we’re going to make more than you.’ But I don’t feel like we contested them well, we just made more shots. We have the personnel to play good defense but we just have to figure out how to do it.”

Lehman is still a work in progress, and there still are some growing pains to endure. But both Pascual and Schulman think the Lightning team you will see later in the season will be vastly different than the one you see now.   

“If we keep working hard on our defense in practice we can be a very tough team,” Pascual said. “But we just have to take it one game at a time.”

“I think it’s about early January when teams begin to see who they really are,” Schulman said. “The one great thing about this group is our guards really move the ball. There’s not a selfish player out there who cares about his stat line or anything like that and that’s a huge bonus. But we do have some work to do.”

Lehman College, Lightning, City University of New York Athletic Conference, CUNYAC, Sean Brennan

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