By Jimmy McCumber

The Albright College men's basketball team held off Elizabethtown in a tense second half, winning 71-61 in their regular season finale.

Senior Dave Singleton finished with 20 points and seven rebounds, while Pedro Perez added 18 points and seven boards. Senior Zach Benjamin had 14 points on 6-of-9 shooting, and junior Sam Marrella had seven assists.

The big play for Albright came with 5:23 remaining. Perez's block led to a fast break, with the junior finishing off Reuel Moore's behind-the-back pass with an up-and-under layup for a 60-53 advantage.

Singleton got a three-pointer to bounce in, making it 63-55. Tyler Simpkiss was all alone under the hoop within the final three minutes but couldn't handle the pass, and Singleton added two free throws at the other end for a ten-point lead.

The Blue Jays had fought back as Albright went 4:26 without a point and 5:07 without a field goal in the second half. A Simpkiss three cut the Lions' lead to 51-48, and Andrew Mantz added two free throws to cut the gap to 51-50.

Perez ended Albright's shooting slump with a put-back off a missed three-pointer, then hit a key triple the next time down the floor for a 58-53 lead.

Benjamin had Albright's first six points of the day, a pair of hoops in the paint and then an elbow jumper to put the Lions up 6-2 early. He then assisted Marrella's three-pointer for a 13-6 lead.

Moore made a steal in Etown's end and threw the ball off a Blue Jay while falling out of bounds. Albright couldn't translate that into points, but Marrella's steal on the next possession led to Cornell Mickens' bucket, a 15-6 advantage, and an Etown timeout.

Off a Lion press break, Moore found Evan Ward with a bounce pass for a 17-8 lead. Singleton stole an inbounds pass and took it all the way for a 21-9 Albright advantage.

Moore hit a running back shot, and Benjamin found Perez underneath to push the gap to 31-17. A nice fast break from Singleton to Kyle Jordan to Perez made it 33-17, and Perez followed that with a three-pointer. The Lions would hold a 38-24 lead at halftime.

Ben Cable's three-pointer opened the second half scoring, and two Lee Eckert free throws suddenly had the Blue Jays within single-digits, 38-29. Phil Wenger found Tom O'Connell with a nice bounce pass to make it 40-31, but Marrella answered with a big three in the left corner. Benjamin followed his own miss to stretch the gap to 43-31.

The Blue Jays made a run, with Simpkiss draining a three to cut the scoreline to 48-40, and Joe Bodnar adding one free throw after chasing down his own missed three.

Albright's starting bigs, Benjamin and Jordan, were both sent to the bench early in the second half with four fouls, leaving the Lions mis-matched underneath.

Moore hit a huge three from the left corner with 11:40 to play, but Will Schlosser answered from long range seconds later to cut the deficit to 51-44.

Albright (#4 in the Mid-Atlantic Region) improves to 20-5, 13-5 and will host Lycoming on Wednesday in a Commonwealth Conference semifinal. Across town, Alvernia will host the play-in game winner (Stevenson at Arcadia) in the other semifinal.