VMI’s men’s basketball team was eliminated from the Southern Conference Tournament after an 84-70 loss to UNC Greensboro on Friday night in Asheville, North Carolina. The Keydets, seeded tenth, trailed by as many as 18 points in the second half but managed to reduce the deficit to 10 with five minutes remaining before UNCG pulled away.
The game saw VMI (6-26) keep pace early before UNCG (14-18) built a double-digit lead late in the first half. A three-pointer by Lillian Marville put the Spartans up by 12 with just over six minutes left in the opening period. VMI responded with baskets from Linus Holmstrom and Kaden Stuckey to cut the gap to four, but UNCG’s Donald Whitehead, Jr. and Justin Neely extended their advantage back to 12 at halftime.
Holmstrom led VMI with six three-pointers and finished with a team-high 24 points. He hit three consecutive threes early in the second half, keeping his team within reach, but UNCG countered each run and maintained control of the game.
Key statistics included UNCG outscoring VMI 46-26 in points in the paint and outrebounding them 40-29. KJ Younger scored a game-high 29 points for UNCG, while teammates Justin Neely (14) and Donald Whitehead Jr. (13) also reached double figures. For VMI, TJ Johnson contributed 15 points; Tan Yildizoglu had 13; and Kaden Stuckey added 12.
VMI head coach Andrew Wilson commented on his team’s effort: “Congratulations to UNCG. I thought they had a really good game plan. They hit the offensive glass tonight and that was the difference in the game. They had 15 offensive rebounds for 19 second-chance points and that made it really difficult for us. We were worried about defending the three tonight and we did a pretty good job defending them from three-point range. They only made six threes tonight, so we took care of that but struggled to finish possessions.
“KJ Younger is a tremendous player for them. For him to come into a tournament setting as a freshman and have 29 points was very impressive.
“I’m proud of my guys. To only play with seven guys – which we did for the last few weeks of the season – and to keep fighting all season long, and to never give in, I’m very proud of them. We got within 10 late in the game, couldn’t quite back make it all the way back, but we stayed with it and kept fighting.”
With this result, VMI’s season comes to an end after competing short-handed through much of its schedule.
