Buffalo, NY - The D'Youville men's basketball team had a historic offensive performance on Saturday afternoon, defeating the Pitt.-Greensburg Bobcats by the final score of 108-90.

Sophomore Jake Socha (Tonawanda, NY/Niagara Catholic) took over the game early in the first half. He scored 11 of the first 17 points for D'Youville as the Spartans were out to a 17-8 lead in the first 4:56 of the game. Greensburg rallied for seven unanswered points before Juan Miguel Rosalies (Guatemala City, Guatemala/Village School) scored six of eight points and D'Youville was back to an eight point lead. 

However, over the next several minutes the Bobcats stepped up their game to tie and then take the lead from D'Youville at 31-30 with 9:00 to go in the first. Greensburg would regain their lead twice in the next few minutes, but the Spartans would take the lead back on a Simeon Heard (Rochester, NY/Charles Finney) made layup with 5:59 remaining. The team had five different scorers in the final four minutes as they opened up a 57-47 lead going into halftime.

Sophomores Socha, Jeremy VanDuluitgaarden (Oneida, NY/Vernon-Verona-Sherrill) and Will VanAuken (Caledonia, NY/Caledonia-Mumford) carried the offense to start the second half. The trio combined to score the first 15 points for the team as they got out to a 16-point lead. Greensburg managed to cut their deficit to single digits with 12:38 remaining in the game and then brought the game to a five-point deficit at 84-79 with 8:37 to go.

The D'Youville offense began to pick up the pace as the game got closer to the end. Socha and Heard led the charge down the stretch, combining for 13 points in the final few minutes of the game. In the final five minutes of the game, the defense of the Spartans took control, allowing only six points. The final horn would sound and D'Youville would capture their second straight victory by the final score of 108-90.

"We showed some of our offensive potential today," said head coach Earl Schunk. "We moved the ball well and got the ball inside. (Scoring) 68 points in the pain is a great number."

Socha had a career game for the Spartans, scoring a game and career high 34 points. Both VanDuluitgaarden and Zach Blask (Portville, NY/Portville) flirted with triple-doubles in the game. VanDuluitgaarden recorded 19 points and nine rebounds, adding six assists while Blask had a double-double with 10 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds. 

Heard had a career game as well, scoring 16 points to go with five rebounds. VanAuken narrowly missed his first double-double of the season after scoring 12 points and grabbing nine rebounds. He added four assists. All five of the D'Youville starters scored in double-figures.

Off the bench, Darrius Hartzog (Rochester, NY/Wilson Magnet), Steve Kunelius (Oswego, NY/Oswego) and Brian Nwaekeke (Corona, CA/John F. Kennedy) each added three points. Rosales scored eight points to lead the reserve players.

Haiden Ward (Bloomsfield, NY/Bloomsfield), Patrick Plummer (Cheektowaga, NY/Cheektowaga), Bryce Little (Arcade, NY/Pioneer) and Mark Jorgensen (Spencerport, NY/Spencerport) each saw action in the game as well.

Coach Schunk gave credit to the Bobcats for playing a competitive game and pushing D'Youville to the very end of the game.

"Greensburg fought hard and made us play the entire 40 minutes," said Schunk. "Because of foul trouble and game situation, I had to play my starters more extended minutes than I'm normally comfortable with, but they came up big in the last six minutes."

Each of the five starters played at least 30 minutes in the game, accounting for 91 total points between the five of them. The 108 points scored by D'Youville in the game is a program record.

On Monday, December 12th the men will travel to play the Hilbert Hawks for their final game before winter break. Tip-off between the WNY rivals will be at 8pm.