Box Score

ONEONTA, NY- Jared Suderley (Newport, NY/West Canada Valley) scored 31 points to lead the Hartwick men's basketball team as the Hawks nearly came back from an early second half deficit but ultimately fell short in the end as visiting Ithaca came away with a 76-70 victory on Friday night at Lambros Arena. The Hawks, who have now dropped their last five games, even their record at 11-11 overall and fall to 3-8 in the Empire 8 Conference. Ithaca improves its record to 15-6 overall and 9-2 in the E8.

Suderley was one point shy of tying his season-high for points which he did back on December 1 against Morrisville. He also grabbed 10 rebounds for his sixth double-double of the season.

Peter Melanson (Little Compton, RI/Bishop Stang) came off the bench and was 6-of-9 from the floor for 12 points to tie his season- and career-high. Matt Petruccione (Saratoga Springs, NY/Bishop Maginn) was 4-of-5 in field goals for nine points.

Sean Rossi paced the Bombers with 23 points and dished out a game-high six assists. Tom Sweeney scored 16 points and Eli Maravich chipped in 12 points, five rebounds, three blocks, two assists, and two steals.

Anthony Keane (Staten Island, NY/Monsignor Farrell) scored the first bucket of the game to give Hartwick the early 2-0 lead in the first half. After an exchange of baskets, Sweeney tied the game at 5-all with a jumper but a layup from Aaron Laing (Laurens, NY/Laurens) gave the Hawks a two-point lead at 14:56.

Hartwick would hold the lead for over four minutes of play until a dunk by Andrew Brandt tied the game up at 11 at the 10:22 mark. Five ties and five lead changes would ensue before Hartwick took a two-point lead on a Petruccione jumper at 6:28.

'Wick's lead proved to be short-lived as IC would come back to tie the game on a jumper by Frank Mitchell and then wrestled back the lead on a Mitchell layup. Hartwick again would tie the contest up on a Suderley jumper but a basket from Sweeney swung the advantage back to the Bombers. Ithaca led by as much was five points for over two minutes until Suderley stole the ball from Maravich with four seconds on the clock and nailed a three-pointer at the buzzer to give the Hawks a 35-34 lead at halftime.

Hartwick looked to carry its momentum into the second half but it was Ithaca which came out strong as it raced out to an 11-0 run in the opening minutes of the half to go up 45-35 at 17:48. The Hawks would start to settle down and work to chip into the IC lead. Hartwick would twice whittle its deficit to two points on a 13-4 run with the second time coming on a jumper by Suderley at 10:06.

A three-point field goal from Ross with just under nine minutes to play in the game pushed the Ithaca lead up to five, 59-54. Hartwick would stay in the game as it would not let the Bombers pull away. IC did lead by as much as nine points, 70-61, with 1:02 left on the clock.

The Hawks would make it a two-possession game four times in the final 50 seconds of play and got to within four points of tying it up after Christian Laputka (Freeland, PA/Hazleton Area) converted a layup with 17 ticks on the clock. Hartwick was forced to foul and did so which put Maravich on the line for two shots. Maravich made both of his attempts to put Ithaca ahead 76-70 with 15 seconds left. The Hawks brought the ball up court and Suderley's three-point attempt with 10 seconds remaining was blocked by Sweeney and rebounded by the Bombers who ran out the clock to hold on for the victory.

The Bombers shot 57% (28-of-49) on the night compared to Hartwick's 48.3% (29-of-60). Ithaca converted 50% (9-of-18) of its three-point attempts as the Hawks only made 21% (4-of-19) of their three-point shots.

'Wick outrebounded the Bombers 29-27. The Hawks controlled the paint with a 42-22 advantage and the bench outscored Ithaca's 29-15. Hartwick had 10 steals on the night led by Kyle Bradley's (Cornwall, NY/Mansfield University) four while Ithaca had six.

The Hawks return to Lambros Arena tomorrow for their final regular season home game of the season. Hartwick will face Elmira with tipoff set for 6 p.m.