LEWISTON, Maine -- The Bates College men's basketball team closed out 2015 with an 83-78 non-league victory over No. 24 nationally ranked Babson College on Thursday afternoon in Alumni Gymnasium, upsetting the visiting Beavers for the second straight season and ending a three-game skid.
Babson (6-4) lost for the fourth time in five games, with all of those losses occurring in non-conference games against NESCAC teams. Bowdoin, Tufts and Amherst previously defeated the Beavers, all in overtime periods.
Bates (5-5) next plays on Saturday, Jan. 2 at 7:30pm against Brandeis in the Springfield College Naismith Classic.
Junior Marcus Delpeche (Wilmington, Del.) shrugged off a subpar performance two days earlier against WPI to tie his career highs with 21 points and four blocked shots in addition to 12 rebounds. Junior Malcolm Delpeche (Wilmington, Del.) added 16 points, including a dunk and three-point play with 3:12 to go in the game, in addition to six rebounds and three blocks. SeniorMike Boornazian (Portland, Conn.) contributed 15 points, 10 rebounds, three steals and a career-high seven assists. Sophomore Shawn Strickland (Middletown, Conn.) scored 12 points, including a corner 3-pointer with 2:38 left in the game that opened up a 75-68 Bates lead, and the sophomore point guard added five assists in the win.
Joey Flannery scored a season-high 35 points for Babson, including a 12-for-14 performance at the free-throw line and an NBA-distance 3-pointer that brought the Beavers back within five points (77-72) with 1:51 left in regulation. Flannery also led Babson with 10 rebounds and two steals. Bradley Jacks scored 14 points with five rebounds and Isaiah Nelsen added 12 points, six rebounds and five assists, but Babson was outrebounded by a 47-31 margin in the game.
Seventeen of Bates' rebounds came off the offensive glass, leading to an 18-5 advantage in second-chance points.
Despite six ties and seven lead changes, Babson led by no more than two points for the entire game, the last occurrence being Davis Stauffer's layup with 10:01 left in the first half. A free throw by Malcolm Delpeche and a three by Strickland, assisted by Malcolm Delpeche, gave Bates the lead for good with 8:59 to go in the first. Boornazian followed with a layup, then a steal and a breakaway dunk for a 24-18 advantage.
A 6-0 run by Babson closed the gap to 31-29 with 2:05 left, but Bates outscored the visitors 7-2 over the final two minutes of the half, capped by junior Quin Leary's (Auburn, Maine) 3-pointer with 18 seconds left, for a 38-31 lead at intermission.
Flannery made a pair of 3-pointers in the opening three minutes of the second half to draw the Beavers back within four (42-38), but Boornazian and Marcus Delpeche combined to score all of Bates' points in a 14-8 spurt that opened the lead to a game-high 10 points with 13:51 to go. Nelsen fed Jacks with an inside pass for a layup to cut the lead back into single digits with 13:23 to go.
Bates' lead stayed in single digits, but no closer than three, for the next 11 minutes. But Flannery's deep three, closely contested by Boornazian, drew the Beavers back within 77-72, and Beavers capitalized on a subsequent Bates turnover with two free throws by Flannery, making it 77-74.
With the clock in its final minute, Nelsen was blocked by Marcus Delpeche but controlled the rebound and made a putback to close the Beavers back within two at 78-76. After a Bates timeout, Boornazian found fellow senior captain Josh Britten (Yarmouth, Maine) open on the right wing, and Britten's 3-pointer rippled through the net for an 81-76 lead with 18 seconds left. Matthew Droney quickly countered with a layup at the other end, but Strickland iced the win with a pair of free throws in the final seven seconds.
Bates defeated Babson 54-51 in November of last season, which turned out to be the first of only three setbacks on the season for the Beavers.