ALFRED, NY- The men's basketball team had the lead at halftime but host Alfred would come back in the second half to defeat the previously unbeaten Hawks 72-66 on Saturday night. Hartwick's record is now 12-1 overall and 1-1 in the Empire 8 while the Saxons improve to 8-3 overall and 1-1 in the Empire 8.
Chris Ryder (Port Washington, NY/Port Washington) led Hartwick with 20 points on 8-for-11 shooting and grabbed eight rebounds. Mark Blazek (Erie, PA/Erie Cathedral Prep) contributed 13 points and Jared Suderley (Newport, NY/West Canada Valley) chipped in 11 points.
Josh Parker led the Saxons with 32 points. He shot 9-of-17 from the field and made 11-of-10 free throw attempts. He also had five steals. Sean Curran had 14 points.
The Hawks started off the game misfiring on their first two shots and Alfred quickly got out to a 10-4 lead. Hartwick would quickly recover it went on a 14-2 run and went up 18-12 with 9:19 to play. The Hawks would eventually push that lead to 10 points, 31-21, with 2:13 left in the half and led 33-25 at halftime.
In the second half, Hartwick would hold its lead but it quickly disappeared as Alfred would come back and take advantage of some costly Hawk turnovers. The Saxons took the lead after a turnover by Blazek and foul by Christian Laputka (Freeland, PA/Hazleton Area) put Parker on the free-throw line and he sank one of two attempts to put Alfred up 46-45 with just over 10 minutes left to play in the game.
The Saxons were up by as much as nine points, 61-52, with 4:11 left to play and seemed to be in control. Hartwick would fight its way back as a three-pointer from Travis Godley (Putnam CT, Putnam Science Academy) and free throws from Suderley and Jon Zehe (Erie, PA/Fairview) made it a 64-61 game with just over two and a half minutes remaining.
After an exchange of turnovers, Parker's layup at 1:49 put Alfred back up by five, but Godley's two free throws put the Hawks back to within three points of tying the game at the 1:24 mark. A Blazek three-point attempt with 59 seconds left was blocked by Parker and after the Saxons converted all four of their free throws, Blazek would hit on a three with 19 seconds to get the Hawks to within four points. Parker, however, made two free throws with 15 seconds remaining to seal the game.
Alfred had a slight advantage in shooting percentage as it shot 39.2 % to Hartwick's 37.9%. The Saxons led in rebounds 42-32. Alfred outscored Hartwick 19-7 overall off of turnovers, including 15-0 in the second half.
The Hawks return home to host Ithaca next Friday night at 8 p.m.
