Four Earn All-TCCC Honors

BOSTON, Mass. – Four members of Wentworth's men's basketball program have been honored by The Commonwealth Coast Conference, as announced this morning by conference commissioner Gregg Kaye.  Junior forward Sam Herrick (Duxbury, Mass.) was named First Team All-TCCC, while senior forwards Matt Abbott (Falmouth, Maine) and Shane West (Milford, N.H.) were named to the conference's second team.  Additionally, head coach Tom Devitt was voted by his peers as the league's coach of the year.

Herrick, who came to the Leopards by way of the University of New Hampshire and Bryant, has been a force inside all season.  Starting 21 of the 24 games he has played in, he is averaging 11.6 points, 9.2 rebounds, 1.2 assists, and 1.2 blocks per game while shooting just under 50 percent from the floor.  He posted 11 double-doubles, including a stretch of six in a row.  He scored a career-high 19 points in a loss to New York University on Jan. 2, and matched that in a win at Colby-Sawyer on Feb. 17 that clinched a first-round home playoff game for Wentworth.

For the second season in a row, Abbott was named to the league's second team.  Starting three of the 24 games he played in, Abbott averaged 9.7 points, 7.1 rebounds, and 1.4 assists per game, while shooting 58.6 percent from the floor.  He recorded a season-high 22 points in a win at Newbury on Jan. 7 when he connected on 11 of 15 shots from the floor and grabbed a season-high 15 rebounds in a win at the University of New England on Feb. 3.  Abbott has played three seasons for the Leopards after transferring from the University of New Hampshire.  During his 75 games in a Wentworth uniform, he has averaged 10.1 points, 7.0 rebounds, and 1.3 assists and has shot nearly 55 percent from the floor.

A two-year captain of the Leopards, West enjoyed a fine senior season for Wentworth.  Starting all 24 games for the Black & Gold, he averaged 9.9 points, 6.8 rebounds, and 2.5 assists per game and shot 60 percent from the floor.  He scored a season-high 16 points in a loss to Wheelock on Nov. 18 and grabbed a season-high 12 rebounds in a win over Curry on Feb. 13, while his seven assists in a win over Regis on Jan. 30 tied a career high.  West has started 87 of the 103 games he has played in, including starting every game the past three seasons.  During this time he has averaged 7.8 points, 6.2 rebounds, and 2.0 assists per game while shooting a respectable 51 percent from the floor.

For the second time in four seasons Devitt earns the league's coach of the year honor.  Picked to finish fourth in the pre-season coaches' poll, Devitt has guided the Leopards to a 14-10 record and a second-place finish in TCCC play with a 10-3 record.  During regular-season conference play, Wentworth featured one of the league's stoutest defenses, topping the conference in offensive rebounds (42.0) and ranking second among TCCC teams in scoring defense (64.9 points per game), scoring margin (+8.7), field goal defense (.395), defensive rebounds (33.4), and rebounding margin (+8.6).  Wentworth also ranked third in three-point field goal defense (.285) and fourth in field goal percentage (.448) and three-point field goal percentage (.348).  The team's impressive rebounding margin ranked sixth among all NCAA Division III teams in the most recent national rankings.  In his eighth season (2000-01; 2003-present) as the Leopards' head coach, he has compiled an 87-116 record – including a 55-49 mark over the last four seasons – and has guided Wentworth to the postseason for five consecutive seasons, including capturing the conference title in 2007.  That season he was also honored by his peers as the league's top coach.  A former assistant coach at both Boston College and American University, Devitt has been on the men's basketball staff at Wentworth since the 1999-2000 season.

Wentworth's second place finish in conference play gives the Leopards their first home playoff game since the 1998-99 season.  The Leopards host seventh-seeded Western New England tonight at 7:00 p.m.