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News Release

Randy Monroe Named America East Conference Men's Basketball Coach of the Year; Five Retrievers Selected All-Conference

3/7/2008

Darryl Proctor has recorded 12 double-doubles this season.

Jay Greene leads the nation in assist-to-turnover ratio.

Vestal, N.Y.—UMBC Head Men’s Basketball Coach Randy Monroe was named America East Conference Coach of the Year and five Retrievers earned all-conference honors, it was announced today at the league’s championship awards ceremony.

Junior guard Jay Greene (Whitehall, Pa.) and junior forward Darryl Proctor (District Heights, Md.) became the first Retrievers to earn First Team all-conference honors. Senior guards Ray Barbosa (Allentown, Pa.) and Brian Hodges (Upper Marlboro, Md.) were selected to the Second Team, while senior forward Cavell Johnson (Fort Washington, Md.) earned Third Team accolades.

Vermont sophomore forward Marqus Blakely, who leads the conference in scoring and rebounding, earned Kevin Roberson Player of the Year honors, while Boston University wing John Holland was the league’s Rookie of the Year.

Monroe presided over the most successful season in UMBC’s 22-year Division I basketball history as the Retrievers won 21 games (21-8) and earned their first post-season tournament bid in school history. Playing with primarily a seven-man rotation, Monroe directed the team to a 10-game improvement over a season ago. The league’s coaches selected UMBC for fifth place prior to the season, but the Retrievers went 13-3 in the conference and won the title by three games over Hartford and defending champion Albany. 

Greene directed the performance between the lines, as he dished out a UMBC single-season record 209 assists. He currently leads the nation in assist-to-turnover ratio (3.37) and is third with 7.22 assists per game. The five-foot-eight dynamo sacrificed his personal scoring output on many occasions, but still managed 8.9 points per game and is fifth in the conference in 3-pt. field goal percentage at 41.4 percent.

Proctor burst on the scene in his first season at UMBC, recording 12 double-doubles and scoring in double figures in 27 of 29 games. The transfer from Coppin State is currently eighth in the league in scoring at 14.7 points per game and second in rebounding with 8.6 caroms per game. The undersized power forward is also fifth in the conference in field goal percentage (48.8%) and ninth in steals per game at 1.55.

Barbosa helped keep the UMBC offense going after Hodges went down with an ankle injury in late January. He has averaged 21.2 points per game in his last eight games and is currently fourth in the conference with 16.8 points per game. The James Madison transfer has hit 76 3-pt. field goals, just five shy of the school single-season record.

Hodges becomes the first Retriever to earn multiple conference honors, as he also was named to the second team in 2007. He was leading the team in scoring this season, until suffering an ankle sprain vs. Albany on January 30 and missed the next five league games. The graduate student still managed to move up to sixth on UMBC’s all-time scoring list with 1,440 points and is the active leading scorer in the conference.

Johnson, the senior team captain, also came on strong down the stretch, despite coming off the bench in UMBC’s final ten games. He hit 61.2 percent from the floor in that stretch and averaged 14 points per game. The James Madison transfer capped the season by posting double-doubles in UMBC’s final two games, including a season-high 24 point effort at Hartford. Johnson is second in the conference in blocked shots and is currently 24^th in the nation (2.3 per game) in that category.

The top-seeded Retrievers will take on eighth-seeded Stony Brook at noon on Saturday in the America East quarterfinals. Should the Retrievers advance through that round and the Sunday semifinals, they would host the league championship game on Saturday, March 15.  

America East Men’s Basketball All Conference

First Team

Marqus Blakely, So., F, Vermont

Jay Greene, Jr., G, UMBC

Brian Lillis, Sr., G, Albany

Darryl Proctor, Jr., F, UMBC

Joe Zeglinski, So., G, Hartford

Second Team

Ray Barbosa, Sr., G, UMBC

Brian Hodges, Sr., G, UMBC

Mike Gordon, Sr., G, Binghamton

Corey Lowe, So., G, Boston Univ.

Mike Trimboli, Jr., G, Vermont

Third Team

Tyrece Gibbs, Jr., G, UNH

John Holland, Fr., F, Boston Univ.

Cavell Johnson, Sr., F, UMBC

Mark Socoby, So., G, Maine

Lazar Trifunovic, So., F, Binghamton

Coach of the Year: Randy Monroe, UMBC

Rookie of the Year: John Holland, Boston Univ.

Defensive Player of the Year: Marqus Blakely, Vermont

Kevin Robertson Player of the Year: Marqus Blakely, Vermont