READING, Pa. – The Ursinus Men's Basketball team used a second half surge and held off a late rally to defeat Albright 75-71 in non-conference action on Tuesday night.
The Bears improved to 2-1 while the Lions dropped to 1-1 in the opening weeks of the season. It was the first meeting between the two schools since the 2014-15 season.
Sophomore
Jamie Murphy continued his sizzling start to the season with a game-high 18 points while totaling nine rebounds, five assists, and three steals. Sophomore
Porter Kelly scored a career-high 14 points off the bench while adding three steals and senior
Mohamed Toure tallied 11 points plus four rebounds.
Junior
Luke Nieman opened the game by making a three-pointer and was fouled to draw a four-point play to give Ursinus the first lead. The Lions responded with an 11-3 run to go up 11-7 at the 14:52-mark of the first half before the Bears countered with a 12-2 run to take a 19-13 lead with 8:05 left in the first half. Ursinus extended its lead to as many as eight points at 29-21 with 5:06 left in the first half, but the Lions scored 11 straight points to go up 32-29 at the 2:48-mark. Ursinus snapped a near three-minute scoreless drought with a pair of free throws to make it 32-31 and trailed 36-33 at halftime.
The Bears opened the second half on a 15-2 run to go up 48-38 at the 13:50-mark and did not allow a Lions field goal until the 13:27-mark. Ursinus extended its lead out to 57-43 behind a 9-2 run with 10:42 left in the second half and went up by as many as 15 points at 62-47 at the 8:45-mark. The Bears maintained a double-digit lead at 68-53 with 6:29 left in regulation, but the Lions stormed back with 13 unanswered points to make it a two-point game with 1:50 left in the second half. Murphy broke a 4:55 scoreless drought with a layup to make it 70-66 and a free throw pushed it to 71-66. Albright made a layup with 28 seconds left in regulation to cut the lead down to 71-68 before the Bears took advantage of a Lions defensive breakdown. Senior
Nick Nocito fired a long outlet pass to first-year
Tomas Belaiter, who dunked it to make it a 73-68 game. Belaiter split a pair of free throw line trips to finish off the win.
The Bears shot 39.1 percent (27-of-69) from the field after going 50 percent in the second half and just 20 percent (6-of-30) from three-point range. Ursinus went 15-of-23 (63.2%) from the free throw line, held a 45-38 rebounding advantage, and scored 24 points off 20 Albright turnovers. Meanwhile, the Lions shot 39.7 percent (23-of-58) from the field and just 25 percent (8-of-32) from three-point range. Albright went 17-of-22 (77.3%) from the free throw line and was led by Jeremiah Stanton with 18 points.
Ursinus has 11 days off before returning to action on Saturday, November 22
nd as they will travel to face Widener at 2:00 p.m.
