Courtesy Middlebury and St. Michael’s Sports Information Offices

Two stories below …

MIDDLEBURY — Nick Gilpin knocked down a three from the right side as time expired, giving Bates (12-12, 4-6) a 90-87 victory at #10 Middlebury on Saturday afternoon. The Panthers (20-4, 6-4) enter the NESCAC Quarterfinals as the fifth seed and will visit fourth-seeded Trinity next Saturday at 3:00 p.m.

Bates jumped out to a 10-4 lead early before Middlebury went on a 10-0 run to go up 14-10 at the 14:54 mark. Tommy Eastman hit a two and a three during the early spurt. Neither team led by more than four throughout the remainder of the half, until a late layup from James Mortimer put the visitors ahead 40-35 at the break.

The game remained tight in the second session, with the Panthers moving ahead 70-65 on a layup from Eastman with 8:00 left on the clock. Matt Folger blocked a shot and converted in transition to put the hosts ahead 81-76 at the 4:28 mark. The Bobcats responded with six-straight points, taking an 82-81 lead with 3:20 left to play.

With the game tied at 87-87, Bates missed a shot with under 10 seconds to play as Middlebury raced up the floor. A Panther slipped in transition and turned the ball over, leading to Gilpin’s game winner from 23 feet out.

Eastman led the Panthers with a career-high 28 points, while Folger recorded his 10th double-double of the season with 19 points and 11 rebounds to go along with four blocks. Max Bosco finished with 13 points, Jack Farrell netted a dozen, while Griffin Kornaker scored eight with four assists. Folger moved into the top 10 among all-time scorers at Middlebury with 1,224 points, surpassing Ben Rudin ’09. Farrell moves into 17th place with 1,039 points, surpassing Fain Hackney ’83, James Thompson ’87 and Nate Anderson ’04.

Gilpin led all scored with 28 points on 10-14 shooting, including 6-8 from long range. He also added nine rebounds and three assists. Jeff Spellman scored 24, while Omar Sarr finished with 17 points and 19 rebounds.

The game featured 14 ties and 15 lead changes, as Middlebury shot 54 percent, with Bates connecting on 46.6 percent of its shots.

COLCHESTER — In a contest that featured 24 lead changes, the Saint Michael’s College men’s basketball led in the final minute before falling to regionally-regarded Franklin Pierce University, 73-70, on Saturday during Northeast-10 Conference play in the Ross Sports Center. The Ravens, who survived a halfcourt shot at the buzzer, received a vote toward last week’s D2SIDA East Region Media Poll.

RECORDS
· Saint Michael’s (7-16, 4-12 NE10), Franklin Pierce (15-8, 10-6 NE10)

SAINT MICHAEL’S LEADERS
· First-year Kasai Brown (Brooklyn, N.Y./Millbrook School), 21 points, 9 rebounds, 2 assists, 11-for-13 free throws, 2-for-4 three-pointers
· Senior Jordan Guzman (Staten Island, N.Y./Xaverian), 20 points, 4 rebounds, 4 steals, 4-for-10 three-pointers
· Senior Eli DiGrande (Essex Junction, Vt./Essex), 10 points, 6 rebounds, 5-for-9 field goals
· Redshirt junior Thomas Jackson III (Middletown, Conn./Holderness School), 7 points, 6 assists (0 turnovers), 4 rebounds, 3 steals
· Sophomore Jontai Williams (Bronx, N.Y./Cardinal Hayes), 5 points, 3 rebounds
· Junior Jason Heter (Andover, N.J./Newton), 5 rebounds
· First-year Jalen Gorham (York, Pa./MacDuffie School), 2 blocks, 2 steals
· Junior Walker Storey (Shelburne, Vt./Champlain Valley Union), 2 blocks

OPPONENT LEADERS
· Sophomore Isaiah Moore, 24 points, 9 rebounds, 6 assists
· Senior Falu Seck, 14 points
· Sophomore Maxwell Zegarowski, 11 points, 3-for-5 three-pointers
· Senior Doyin Fadojutimi, 8 points, 6 rebounds, 5 offensive rebounds

GAME FACTS
· Franklin Pierce received a vote toward the latest D2SIDA East Region Media Poll.
· Saint Michael’s has suffered nine losses by 10 points or fewer, including six by five points or less.
· The teams combined for 24 lead changes and 11 ties in the game, with neither team leading by more than six points.
· The Purple Knights have played teams associated with the regional poll well recently, with their last two wins against regionally-ranked foes and the victory prior to that against a squad that had been ranked early in January.
· Brown and Guzman both scored 15 points in the second half, accounting for 30 of their team’s 36 points in the stanza.
· Guzman became the seventh Purple Knight to ever make 70 three-pointers in a season, with 70 exactly.
· Both teams committed 13 turnovers, with Saint Michael’s registering 10 steals. The hosts held edges in shooting (42.1%-38.9%) and three-point percentage (40.9%-31.4%).
· Saint Michael’s held Fadojutimi, who entered the day tied for seventh in the NCAA East Region and fourth in the NE10 in scoring (19.8), to only eight points on 13 shots.

THE ACTION
· Sophomore Brandon Kolek’s lay-up at 12:34 of the first half capped a 4-0 spurt that gave Franklin Pierce an 11-7 advantage, the largest for either team in the opening 27:26 of the game.
· Twelve lead changes occurred in the first stanza, including eight during a later 7:26 span, which Jackson capped with a driving lay-up at 1:16, giving the hosts a 29-28 edge. Another basket by Jackson pushed the lead to three before Moore canned a tying triple at 32 seconds, but Jackson found Brown on the wing for a buzzer-beating three-pointer. The hosts carried a 34-31 lead into the locker room.
· Brown’s triple at 16:06 of the second half had the Purple Knights up 39-38 before Moore’s lay-in 33 seconds later accounted for the fifth lead swing in a matter of 2:43. Zegarowski later buried a three to extend the lead to 46-41 with 12:33 left.
· Guzman knocked down a three, Williams hit a jumper and DiGrande’s converted Williams’ pass for a tying lay-in at 10:00 to cap a 7-2 run.
· Junior Sam van Oostrum had a three-point play and Seck a three-pointer in an 8-2 response, handing the Ravens a 56-50 lead – the largest for either team – with 7:46 remaining.
· Brown twice swung the lead in his team’s favor during a personal 9-2 run, including giving Saint Michael’s a 59-58 edge on a jumper at 4:47, and Guzman buried a three from the wing to make it 62-58 with 4:06 to go.
· Moore and Seck canned back-to-back triples, and Seck’s lay-up finished off an 8-0 jaunt that had the Ravens up 66-62 with 2:16 left.
· Guzman’s driving lay-up at 2:00 was followed by Brown knocked down all three free throws after being fouled shooting a triple, and the hosts were back in front at 67-66 with 1:16 remaining.
· Moore’s go-ahead three with 57.9 seconds left was met by Guzman’s own three-pointer at 39.8 ticks from the wing, and the hosts had a 70-69 edge.
· After the teams exchanged 30-second timeouts, van Oostrum made a reverse lay-up at 15.0 seconds to flip the lead back in his team’s favor, and a Purple Knight missed a driving bucket at the other end in the waning seconds. Seck snagged the board and was fouled before hitting two freebies at 1.7 seconds.
· With his team now down three, Heter inbounded from the baseline to Brown, whose desperation heave from beyond midcourt hit the backboard just to the right of the rim as the buzzer sounded.

NEXT SAINT MICHAEL’S GAME
· Wednesday vs. Stonehill College, 7:30 p.m.
· The Skyhawks are eighth in this week’s D2SIDA East Region Media Poll.