W&M RUNS VMI SLIDE TO 7 GAMES

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, February 4, 1993                   TAG: 9302040101
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: C2   EDITION: STATE 
SOURCE: CHRIS BACHELDER STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LEXINGTON                                LENGTH: Medium
W&M RUNS VMI SLIDE TO 7 GAMES
VMI hung tough, but the Keydets' slide is still alive.
Wednesday night at Cameron Hall, William and Mary handed the Keydets their seventh consecutive basketball loss, 77-67, in non-conference play.
The losing streak is the school's longest since the 1983-84 team went eight games without winning.
VMI trailed 34-28 at halftime and made a small run at the Tribe to start the second half. Lewis Preston and Lawrence Gullette each scored inside as the Keydets cut their deficit to 35-32 with 17:51 to go.
William and Mary then made a 14-7 run to take a 49-39 lead with 13:56 to play. Former Alleghany player Todd Cauthorn scored six points in the run, and Preston had all of VMI's points during that span.
The Tribe's lead stayed between seven and 13 points the rest of the way. Matt Verkey scored five straight to give William and Mary a 60-47 lead with 7:34 left.
The Keydets (5-13) scratched back to 70-63 on a Preston 12-footer with 1:21 remaining, but W&M finished by going 7-for-8 on free throws.
Kurt Small led the Tribe with 21 points and 11-for-12 free-throw shooting. Cauthorn added 15 points with 10 rebounds.
"The thing I like about our ball club tonight is that we competed," Keydets coach Joe Cantafio said. "We moved our feet and got after it.
"We missed some free throws [10], and when you do that, you can't win the close ones, but we played hard.
"The thing we've got to do is get the ball to Lewis Preston more. He needs the ball 20 times."
Preston finished with 22 points on 9-for-12 shooting. Juan Banks added 12 points, and Jonathan Penn and freshman Howard Byrd had 10 each.
The Tribe got off to a quick start. Cauthorn and Thomas Roberts each scored four points in the paint, and David Cox and Verkey put in 3-pointers as William and Mary took a 15-5 lead with 12:45 remaining in the first half.
Preston scored eight of VMI's first nine points on 4-for-4 shooting. Penn followed Preston's final bucket with two free throws to cut the Tribe's lead to 17-11 with 11:10 to play.
William and Mary scored seven straight to push its lead to 24-11, the first of its three 13-point first-half leads. Small made two free throws to make it 26-13, then, after a Penn layup, Small hit a running shot to give his team a 28-15 edge at 5:19.
The Keydets then reeled off eight straight, the last six on back-to-back 3-pointers by Bobby Prince and Banks, to cut the lead to 28-23 with 2:46 to go.
Banks added a driving layup and another 3-pointer to finish the half 4-for-4 with 10 points in nine minutes of play.
Sean Duff and Brendan Connor each made a 3-pointer for William and Mary in the final 2:30 to give the Tribe its six-point halftime lead.
VMI shot 52.4 percent (11-for-21) in the first half but committed seven turnovers against William and Mary's tough man-to-man pressure.
Six freshmen played a total of 49 first-half minutes for VMI.

by Archana Subramaniam by CNB