FREDERICK, Md.—The Hood College men's basketball team (4-4, 1-3 CAC) lost in dramatic fashion on a last second turnover at the end of a wild game Saturday evening. The loss was the Blazers' third straight defeat in conference play and their first defeat at the newly opened BB&T Arena.

In a game that saw many twists and turns throughout, the one constant was senior Hood guard Ramon Smith. Smith had a career night scoring 29 points on 9-of-13 shooting in his first career Blazer start. He converted both three-point shots he attempted and went 9-of-10 from the foul line. St. Mary's (7-2, 3-0 CAC) did not have an answer for Smith as his tenacity on both ends of the court fueled the Blazers for most of the game. The Seahawks were paced by Devin Spencer, who scored 17 points including going 5-of-9 from three.

Hood had a chance to tie or win the game inbounding from under the basket with 1.2 seconds left. Junior Trey Quinn inbounded the ball in the direction of Smith but it was deflected out of bounds. The referees awarded the basketball to St. Mary's despite pleas from the Hood players and bench that they had not touched the ball. St. Mary's proceeded to throw the ball towards the other end of the court thus running out the remaining 0.9 seconds of the contest.

One of the game-changing plays of the game, which turned out to be huge, was a last second steal and running shot by St. Mary's guard Chris Hutchinson. Hutchinson got a hand on a Hood pass with less than two seconds remaining in the half and buried a running 20-foot jumper to send the Seahawks into the half with a seven-point lead. Those two points wound up being huge as they were the difference in the game.

Hood fought back on numerous occasions in the second half when it looked like St. Mary's would possibly pull away. Smith scored 18 of his 29 points in the second half, including a three from another zip code as the shot clock expired to cut St. Mary's lead to three at 65-62 with five minutes remaining. The teams traded basket for basket for the last five minutes with the St. Mary's lead never being more than four. Quinn missed a free throw for Hood on purpose and ended up getting his own rebound and scoring to cut St. Mary's lead to one with 9.0 seconds left.

St. Mary's did a good job of keeping the ball away from Hood off the inbounds taking 5.0 seconds off the clock before Hood could get a foul. Seahawk forward Jeff Haus made both free throws to give St. Mary's a 72-69 lead. Quinn was fouled intentionally by St. Mary's, whose head coach Chris Harney's strategy did not allow Hood to take a three and tie the game. Quinn sank the first free-throw and intentionally missed the second as Hood forward LaVar Rich came up with a big rebound but just missed the tying layup with the ball eventually going out of bounds off St. Mary's. Hood would then commit its 19th and most costly turnover allowing St. Mary's to escape with the win.

Hood returns to action Dec. 18 when they take on University of Metropolitan in San Juan, Puerto Rico at 5 p.m.