BUFFALO, NY -- Buffalo center Vadim Fedotov scored a career-high 17 points and pulled down nine rebounds to lead the host Bulls to a 68-59 victory over Canisius College Tuesday night in Alumni Arena. The win snapped UB's two-game losing streak and improved the Bulls to 3-3 on the year, while the Golden Griffins slipped to 0-5 with the loss.
For Canisius, junior Willie Hassell scored a team-high 12 points and secured three steals, while sophomore guard Frank Turner added 10 points to go with a season-high eight rebounds. Freshman Greg Logins (pictured) came off the bench for the Blue and Gold to score a career-high eight points to go with a career best 12 boards in 30 minutes of action.
Trailing 22-17 with 7:31 left in the first half, Canisius freshman Elton Frazier got the Blue and Gold within two at 22-20 with a traditional three-point play after he scored a lay-up and knocked down a free throw for three of his five points on the night. But Frazier's field goal would be Canisius' last in the first half, as the Bulls outscored the Griffs 13-3 in the final 6:35 of the first stanza, with four points coming from Fedotov and Rodney Pierce in the run. Buffalo went into the locker room at the intermission with a 35-23 lead after Jawaan Alston tipped in a loose rebound as the horn sounded.
Canisius came out of the locker room and made a run at Buffalo, using a 12-6 run over the first 5:23 of the second half to cut the Bulls' margin to 43-37 with 14:37 left in the game. During that stretch, Tomas Vazquez-Simmons scored six points and Logins added four more, but Buffalo stretched its lead back to 11 points with back-to-back 3-pointers by reserves Sean Smiley and Calvin Betts.
“Our Achilles heel all year long has been turnovers, and we addressed the fact that we had 10 of them in the first half,” Canisius head coach Tom Parrotta said. “We did a better job of taking care of the ball and turned it over only four times in the second half. Right now we are struggling to put 40 quality minutes together. We need to play from start to finish the way we came out and played in the second half.”
For the game, Buffalo shot 42.9 percent from the field and 76.2 percent from the free-throw line after sinking 12-of-15 tosses in the second half. Canisius shot 33.3 percent from the field and connected on just 19 percent (4-for-21) of its shots from 3-point range. The Griffs out rebounded the Bulls by a 47-38 count, with 24 of those rebounds coming off the offensive glass.
Vazquez-Simmons and sophomore Jovan Robinson scored eight points apiece in the loss for Canisius, with Vazquez-Simmons adding seven rebounds and three blocks to his stat line. Robinson scored all eight of his points in the first half after going 3-for-6 from the floor and 2-for-4 from behind the arc.
The Griffs will return to action Saturday, Dec. 1, as the team travels to Olean, N.Y., to meet long-time rival St. Bonaventure. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m.
Game Notes: The meeting with Buffalo was the 40th in school history, with the Griffs holding a 28-12 advantage in the all-time series... Frank Turner has posted double figures in the scoring column in three-straight games... Tomas Vazquez-Simmons has at least two blocks in each of his first five college games... Greg Logins is the second Canisius player to record 10-plus rebounds in a game this year, and his 30 minutes of game action is a season high... Before the game, both Canisius and Buffalo signed a banner for former Griff guard Brian Dux, who was injured in a car accident in England Nov. 10... Both teams joined at midcourt for a pregame photo with the banner, which will be sent to Dux as he recovers in a British hospital.
