BALTIMORE, Md. -- Sophomore Four McGlynn scored a season-high 21 points to lead second-seeded Towson past seventh-seeded James Madison, 80-71, in the quarterfinals of the 2014 Colonial Athletic Association men's basketball championship on Saturday at Baltimore Arena.

Towson (23-9), which defeated the Dukes three times this season, won its seventh straight game and moves on to Sunday's semifinals to face third-seeded William & Mary at 5:00 p.m.

Sunday will mark the Tigers' first trip to the CAA semifinals since 2009. Towson's seven-game winning streak is its longest since also winning seven straight at the end of the 1993-94 season.

Despite not making a single two-point field goal, senior Jerrelle Benimon notched his NCAA Division I-leading 21st double-double of the season by scoring 18 points and grabbing 10 rebounds. The forward shot 2-for-3 from beyond the arc and made 12 of 21 free throws.

McGlynn scored his most points in a Tiger uniform in large part to his 4-for-5 shooting effort from beyond the arc. The guard, who leads the CAA in free throw shooting percentage, connected on 9 of 10 attempts from the line.

Senior Mike Burwell scored 17 points and classmate Marcus Damas added 14 for the Tigers in the win.

JMU (11-20), which won last season's CAA championship, was paced by Andre Nation, who recorded 18 points and five boards off the bench. Charles Cooke netted 14 points and Ron Curry supplied 13 points on top of five rebounds and five assists.

Towson shot 9-for-16 from beyond the arc and also set tournament records for free throws made (39) and attempted (61) in a game. The 61 free throw attempts set a new school record.

With 10:41 to play, Towson took a 53-41 lead after McGlynn nailed his fourth three-pointer of the game. Just over a minute later, in between two JMU free throws, Burwell hit a trey to give Towson its biggest lead of the contest at 58-43.

The Dukes battled back with a 12-3 run, cutting their deficit to 61-55 with 5:36 to play. As it did for most of the game, though, Towson answered with a big three-point play from Damas to push the lead to nine (64-55). The Tigers stayed in control the rest of the way.

Towson came out of the gates firing and jumped out to a quick 24-12 lead midway through the first half. During the game-opening run, the Tigers utilized the deep-ball, sinking four shots from behind the arc, two of which came from McGlynn.

Although the Towson lead grew to as many as 13 late in the half, JMU received a spark off the bench from Nation, who led the way during a 7-1 run by the Dukes that cut the deficit to 34-27 at halftime. Nation paced all scorers with 10 points in the first 20 minutes of play.

Top-seeded Delaware will take on fifth-seeded Northeastern in Sunday's other CAA Tournament semifinal. Both games can be seen live nationally on the NBC Sports Network.


-TowsonTigers.com-