Box Score Pleasantville, N.Y - The Adelphi University men's basketball team erupted for 54 points in the second half, turning a six-point halftime deficit into an eight-point win over Pace University, 93-85. The victory is the eighth win of the season for the Brown and Gold.
Michael Coffey led five Panthers (8-3, 4-1 NE10) in double figures with 27 points, doing a fair amount of damage at the foul line, where he went 10-12.
Conor McGuinness and
Austin Beech also turned in strong performances, with McGuinness adding 21 points and 11 assists, while Beech did a little bit of everything, scoring 14 points, grabbing five rebounds and handing out seven assists.
Manny Suarez and
Jack Laffey joined their teammates in double figures with 11 points each.
The Adelphi defense stepped up early in the first half, helping the Panthers build their largest lead of the period 18-9. A
Nick Cambio triple with 13:36 on the clock capped the Brown and Gold march. However, the tables turned over the next five minutes, with Adelphi scoring just four points, while the Setters (4-6, 1-5 NE10) put 15 on the board, wrestling the lead back, 24-22 on an Austin Mofunanya layup at the 8:51 mark.
The Panthers used a Beech three-pointer to retake the lead, 35-34 with 5:01 remaining in the first half, but Pace closed the stanza on an 11-4 scoring run, sending the game into intermission with Adelphi trailing, 45-39.
The Brown and Gold turned up the defensive pressure early in the second frame, holding the hosts to just four points in the first three and a half minutes of action, while throwing 10 points on the board, including a Coffey lay-in that tied the game at 49.
Over the next few minutes the game remained close, with Adelphi clinging to a one-point lead, thanks to two Coffey made free throws, 58-57. From there, a 9-2 Brown and Gold spurt pushed the bulge to eight points, 67-59, capped by a Suarez triple with just under 10 minutes to play.
Adelphi took their largest lead of the game, 11 points, 82-71, on a converted lay-up from McGuinness with 4:09 left in the contest, while Pace cut that margin to three on two occasions down the stretch. The second and final instance was with just 70 seconds left, 86-83, on another Mofunanya lay-up, but the Brown and Gold made seven of eight free throws down the stretch to slam the door and leave Pleasantville with a 93-85 win.
The Panthers return to action on Monday, December 12 when they travel across the Tappan Zee Bridge to tip-off against Nyack College in Nyack, N.Y. at 7:30 pm.
NOTES
- Adelphi picked up their eighth win on December 8 last year against Salem International, 94-59, putting the Panthers just two days behind the blistering pace that earned them 20 wins a year ago.
- The Panthers are 4-0 all-time against Nyack, including a 78-72 overtime victory last year in Garden City.
- Adelphi has three of the top five point scorers in the conference.
Michael Coffey is tied for first in the conference with 243 total points, while
Jack Laffey is fourth (193) and
Manny Suarez (192) is fifth.
About Adelphi Athletics:
Adelphi University joined the Northeast-10 Conference in the fall of 2009 and in the past seven seasons, has collected 20 regular season conference titles, 24 tournament championships, 29 individual crowns and captured the Northeast-10 Presidents' Cup three times (2013, 2014, and 2016), while winning five NCAA Division II National Championships.
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