Box Score
John Carroll had its season end in the NCAA Division III Championship round of 16 Friday night, as the Guilford College inside game in the first half and outside game in the second proved to be too much to handle in a 78-73 loss in front of a packed house at the DeCarlo Varsity Center.
Guilford will advance to face UT-Dallas in what amounts to be a neutral site game for the right to advance to the Division II "Final Four" in Salem, Virginia, next weekend.
John Carroll not only had its 2008-09 season come to an end, but also had its school record 21-game winning streak snapped with the loss.
The Blue Streaks had the upper hand in the early part of the contest, taking a pair of four point leads. The last of those leads occured when
Matt Crozier (Philadelphia, PA, LaSalle College) made a lay-up with 14;20 to go in the first half for a 17-13 lead.
In perhaps its most frustrating seven minutes of basketball all season, John Carroll would be held scoreless as Guilford embarked on a 13-0 run. When Eric High sank a jumper with 7:53 left in the opening period, the visiting Quakers had a 26-17 lead.
It would get worse for the Blue Streaks before it got better. Tyler Sanborn, a 6-10 center for the Quakers, had a monster first half in which he had 14 rebounds to go with 11 points. His final bucket of the first half gave Guilford its largest lead of the contest at 35-21 with 3:31 showing on the clock.
JCU closed the half on an 8-2 run to cut the margin down to 37-29, the last points coming on a Crozier put back with six seconds left.
The Blue Streaks continued to show life in the second half, and would whittle the Quakers' lead to a single point on joe Meyer's three-pointer at the 15:06 mark. Just as John Carroll closed to 41-40, Guilford answered by scoring 15 of the next 20 points, capped by a Sanborn dunk, to push the lead back to double digits.
John Carroll made several mini runs at Guilford but could never close the gap completely. It was a four-point game with 7:03 left following a three-pointer by
Rudy Kirbus (Willoughby Hills, OH, Cleveland St. Ignatius), and on five other occasions JCU would lower the deficit to four before a
Chris Zajac (Brecksville, OH, Brecksville-Broadview Heights) jumper made it a three-point contest with 1:57 remaining.
The Quakers would keep John Carroll at bay, however, as the Blue Streaks were never able to get their hands on the ball with a chance to tie or take the lead in the final two minutes. Guilford made five of six free throws in the final 27 seconds to preserve the win.
Guilford (24-5) was led by 23 points and 19 rebounds from Sanborn, who was 11-18 from the field. Rhett Bonner added 21 points as he was 7-12 from the field, 2-5 from three-point range and 5-6 from the free throw line. Clay henson added 12 as the Quakers shot 30-57 (.526) from the field for the game.
The Quakers are heading to the program's second round of eight game in Guilford history.
John Carroll (25-5), which finishes with the second highest winning percentage in program history at .833, had four players in double figures.
Tyler Kirsch (Gates Mills, OH, Hawken) had a season-high 14 points on 5-7 shooting from the field.
Corey Shontz (Andover, OH, Pymatuning Valley) added 12, while
Crozier and
Maurice Haynes II (Cleveland, OH, Villa Angela-St. Joseph) added ten apiece.
This was John Carroll's first home loss all season and its first loss in ten NCAA playoff games in its postseason history.