MSMC Has Winning Streak Halted at Maritime

THROGGS NECK – The Mount Saint Mary College Men’s Basketball team saw its five game winning streak come to an end on a three-pointer in the closing seconds of a hard fought 81-78 road conference loss at Maritime. Junior Gerard Nocera continued his strong campaign with 20 points for the Knights.

After grabbing a 7-4 lead on a Daniel Wolff triple in the opening moments, the Privateers used a 15-0 run to grab a 19-7 lead with 12:53 left before halftime. Patrick MacDonald keyed the run for Maritime with six points.

Trailing by 12 points, the Mount climbed to within four points with 9:11 left in the first half on another Wolff three-pointer and used a fast break bucket from Connor Nicholson with just under five minutes left before halftime to even the score at 29-29.

The Knights would knot the score two more times over the final 4:22 of the half, but a quick 8-2 run, sparked by three-pointers from John Liccesse and Brendon Halligan, sent the Privateers into the intermission with a 44-38 advantage.

Mount Saint Mary finished the first half shooting 42.4-percent from the floor and knocked in five three-pointers, including three from Wolff, and went a perfect 5-for-5 from the free-throw line. Wolff and freshman Jovin Ramos led the first half scoring attack with nine points each.

The Knights quickly found themselves down by nine points on a Tim Hock three-pointer 2:59 into the second stanza and would trail in the period until a Nicholson three-pointer moved the Mount in front 66-64 with 6:33 left in regulation time.

A MacDonald bucket would knot the score at 68-68 for Maritime and a Michael Walker triple pushed Maritime in front 71-68 with just under five minutes left to play.

A pair of T.J. Patsalos free-throws with 4:09 left gave the Knights their final lead of the game as Maritime used a 7-2 spurt capped by a MacDonald bucket to gain a 78-74 lead with 60 seconds left on the clock.

Mount Saint Mary went on to get a bucket from Tyler McDine and a pair of free-throws from Nocera to tie the score at 78-78 with 13 seconds left, but a triple from Brendan McGovern coming out of a timeout with four seconds left accounted for the final lead change of the afternoon.

Mount Saint Mary shot an even 50-percent in the second half and went 7-for-7 from the free-throw line, but converted just one of its seven attempts from behind the arc. The Knights finished the day shooting just over 46-percent and outscored Maritime by 10 in the paint.

Nocera finished 8-for-15 from the floor and added five rebounds, three assists and two steals to his team-high point total. Ramos netted a career-high 13 points after going 5-for-8 from the floor, adding a team best three steals.

Nicholson and Wolff combined for five of the team’s six makes from three-point range, finishing with 14 and 13 points, respectively. Wolff grabbed five rebounds in the game, joining Nocera and Patsalos with the team-high in the category. McDine chipped in with six points and matched his career-high with nine assists.

Maritime received 24 points and 14 rebounds, both game-highs, from MacDonald who finished an efficient 10-for-11 from the floor. Halligon chipped in with 17 points, hitting four triples, with Liccesse finishing with nine points and six assists.