Jan 06, 2017
Senior captain Kyle Edwards scored 14 points to join the St. Lawrence University men's basketball team's 1,000 point club, but it wasn't enough to extend the Saints' winning streak to eight games, as SUNY Brockport held off a late comeback effort to beat St. Lawrence, 79-73, in a non-league game in Brockport on Friday.
Edwards, who entered the game with 999 career points, hit the milestone just two minutes, 13 seconds into the game with a pair of free throws to give the Saints an 8-3 lead.
"One thousand points is a great accomplishment," said head coach Chris Downs. "Kyle's been a consistent player for us for the last four years, and he's one of the big reasons we've had such a great start to the season, tonight's result notwithstanding."
After Edwards scored his 1,000th and 1001st points, Brockport went on an 11-0 run to take the lead and never trailed again, building a 45-29 halftime lead.
Earlier this week, St. Lawrence trailed Clarkson by 12 points with less than four minutes to play, but came back to defeat the Golden Knights in double overtime, 111-105.
On Friday night, however, they faced a much larger deficit, falling behind by 21 points, 55-34, early in the second half. The Saints responded with an 18-6 run to cut the lead to single digits to get back in the game.
Willie Zachery later added a personal 7-0 run with consecutive 3-pointers, then hit a three throw with 2:43 to play to cut the lead to 72-67. Kyle Kobis made it a one-possession game when his 3-pointer with 1:22 to play cut the lead to 74-71, but the Golden Eagles made five free throws down the stretch to put the game away.
"Brockport is a good team," said Downs. "We got off to a slow start, and you can't get down as big as we did on the road and expect a positive outcome. We have not played well since returning from break and I hope this serves as a wakeup call."
Riley Naclerio led the team with 19 points, and Kobis and Ben Crawford were also in double figures with 11 points each.
Hamed Shamseldin led all scorers with 21 points in 17 minutes off the bench for the Golden Eagles (9-2). Devonn Gavin added 17 points, and Jon Carnegie (12) and Cordell Torres (10) were also in double figures for Brockport, which is receiving votes in the D3Hoops.com national poll.
The loss snapped a seven-game winning streak for the Saints, who go back on the road to face SUNY Oswego next Tuesday.