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American Defeats Lafayette, Advances to Patriot League Final
Stokes scores 26 points to lead Eagles

March 9, 2003

Boxscore

Glenn Stokes scored 26 points to lead AU past Lafayette, and into the Patriot League Championship game.

UPPER MARLBORO, Md. - American University took a familiar path to the championship game of the Patriot League Tournament, and will face an equally familiar foe. For the second straight year, the Eagles will take on Holy Cross in the championship game, and once again it was after they defeated Lafayette in the semifinals. The only difference is this year the Eagles will be on the road.

Senior Glenn Stokes (Silver Spring, Md./Albert Einstein) led all scorers with 26 points, and he connected on six-of-10 three-pointers. Stokes’ performance was just one point short of his career-high of 27 points. Stokes also added four rebounds, one assist and one steal in 32 minutes. Stokes scored 16 of his points (four three-pointers) in the first half, as AU built a 20-point halftime lead, 44-24. The Eagles finished the first 20 minutes on a 15-2 run, as Lafayette could manage just one field goal over the final 5:47.

Aside from Stokes’ early contributions, Raimondas Petrauskas (Mazeikiai, Lithuania/Lithuanian Physical Culture Academy) also was big early. Petrauskas scored six points in 1:35 on three offensive rebounds as AU pushed the lead from 12-5 to 18-7. For the game Petrauskas finished with six points, six rebounds and two assists in 14 minutes.

In the second half the Eagles pushed the lead to 26 points, before the final 19-point victory margin. Twice Lafayette cut the lead to 19, with the last coming at 5:59 (63-44), but AU responded with a score quickly each time.

For the game, AU committed a season-low seven turnovers and registered 17 assists.

Jernavis Draughn (Triangle, Va./Potomac Senior) was outstanding. He was six-of-eight from the field, hauled down five rebounds and dished out one assist in 27 minutes. Andres Rodriguez (San Juan, Puerto Rico/Colegio San Ignacio) once again led everyone with five assists, and he also had three boards and three steals Despite some serious foul trouble, Matej Cresnik (Velenje, Slovenia/University of Ljubljana) managed nine points on four-of-seven shooting. Steve Miles (Alexandria, Va./Hayfield) had a quiet night with ten points, five boards and two assists.

Lafayette was led by Rob Dill, who scored 14 points and grabbed a game-high 14 rebounds. Winston Davis chipped in 13 points. Lafayette shot just 15.8 percent from three-point land (3-for-19). For the second straight game AU held Justin DeBerry to under five points. This time, DeBerry managed just four points, and all of those came from the free throw line. Against Colgate in the quarterfinals, DeBerry had tied his career-high of 29 points.

In a rematch of last year’s Patriot League championship game, The No. 2 seeded American (16-13/9-5) will play No. 1 Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass. At stake, aside from the Patriot League title, will be the automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. The game will be televised live on ESPN at 4:30 p.m.