It was five down and counting, as the Bard College men’s basketball team lost all their games in Liberty League play over the past two weeks.
It started on Jan. 18, when Union College senior Evan Croll (Vernon, N.Y.) made a three-pointer with 32 seconds left in the game so the Dutchmen could hold off upset-minded Bard, 63-58.
Bard, although never ahead in the second half, cut Union’s lead to 58-55 on a layup by sophomore Chris McNaughton (State College, Pa.) with 58 seconds remaining. Union’s next possession went deep into the shot clock, but Croll took a pass from Matt Petrone (Utica, N.Y.) and drilled a three-pointer from the right wing to silence a boisterous crowd at the Stevenson Athletic Center.
Union senior Keven Donohue, who scored 30 of his team’s 63 points, calmly sank a pair of free throws with 18 seconds left to seal the victory. Union is 13-2 overall, 5-1 in the Liberty League.
Bard rallied from a 12-point deficit in the first half and was trailing 27-25 at the break. The Raptors cut the lead to one three times but never got over the hump. Lamar Powell (West Orange, N.J.) led Bard with 13 points.
Donohue went 9-for-18 from the field and 9-for-10 from the line to finish with 30 points, and he also grabbed six rebounds. Nobody else finished in double figures for Union, but Petrone was the game’s top rebounder with 10.
The scene was similar the next night as Skidmore College managed an 11-3 run over a three-minute span early in the second half to break open a close game and beat Bard by 65-48.
Skidmore improved to 11-5 overall and 5-2 in the Liberty League with the victory.
Skidmore freshman Aldin Medunjanin (New York, N.Y.) had a triple-double, with 11 points, 10 rebounds and 10 assists. He was one of five Skidmore players who finished in double-figure scoring, as the Thoroughbreds shot a scalding 61 percent from the field in the second half.
When Bard freshman Pat Lichtenstein (Ocean, N.J.) hit a three-pointer with 15:45 to go in the game, the Raptors had trimmed a 10-point halftime deficit to just four, 34-30. But Skidmore scored 11 of the next 14 points and never looked back. Medunjanin had two points, two assists and a rebound during that key stretch.
Skidmore was led by senior Kevin Dahill (Dobbs Ferry, N.Y.), who finished with 17 points; Connor Merrill (Panton, Vt.) added 14, Sakhile Sithole (Pietermaritzburg, South Africa) had 11, and Tanner Brooks chipped in with 10.
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