Men's Basketball Edged on the Road at Pace, 71-67
PLEASANTVILLE, NY- The Merrimack men's basketball team dropped a slim decision on the road at Pace Wednesday evening. The Warriors sink to 9-9 overall and 6-8 in the Northeast-10 Conference with the loss. The Setters improved to 9-9 on the year and 7-7 in the league with the victory.
Mike Clifford (Danvers, MA) registered his second-straight double-double as he poured in a career-high 23 points and grabbed 13 rebounds. Roland Davis (Deer Park, NY) finished with 16 points, five assists and three steals off the bench. Wayne Mack (Paterson, NJ) and Aaron Strothers (Wareham, MA) both chipped in with nine points and six boards.
The game was closely-contested in the opening portion as Pace clung to a narrow lead.
A 7-0 run erased a five-point deficit and gave Merrimack its first advantage of the night with 12:29 left to play in the first half as Davis drained a jumper to break a 13-13 tie.
As the first frame winded down, the Setters extended their lead to seven points to head into the halftime break up 36-29.
The two squads locked even four times through the opening 20 minutes of play.
The Warriors shot 37.1% from the field in the first half while Pace connected on 48.9% of its field goal attempts.
Davis paced the visitors at intermission with eight points and Clifford added six points and six rebounds.
Right out of the gate in the second half, Merrimack sank back-to-back buckets to chop the hosts' advantage to three.
The Warriors seized their first lead of the second stanza, 42-40, as Davis knocked down a trey with 14:28 remaining.
After knotting the score for the seventh time, Merrimack grabbed a six-point advantage with 9:20 showing on the clock when Clifford flushed a layup, 54-48.
An 8-0 stretch by Pace spanning 2:32 elevated the home side to a four-point lead with 51 seconds remaining.
Mack pulled the Warriors to within one of tying the game as he converted a pair of free throw attempts with 21 seconds on the clock.
The Setters sank three of four shots from the charity stripe in the waning seconds of the contest to hang on for the win.
Merrimack finished with a field-goal percentage of 45.2% after shooting 55.6% in the second half. Despite owning a second-half field-goal percentage of 36%, Pace concluded the game shooting 42.6%.
The Warriors held a 39-35 edge over the Setters on the glass.
"We played well in stretches tonight but weren't able to come away with a win," said head coach Bert Hammel, who coached his 900th career game Wednesday. "We need to do a better job of getting defensive stops and rebounding the ball. We'll have a chance to bounce back on Saturday."
Merrimack returns to Hammel Court to host Assumption Saturday, January 28 at 3:30 pm.
