BROOKLYN, N.Y. (Dec. 4, 2010) – Sophomores Will Felder (Cleveland, OH/Lutheran East Hs) (Cleveland, Ohio / Lutheran East) and Chris Johnson (Newport News, Va./Denbigh) (Newport News, Va. / Denbigh) had career-best performances, but it wasn't enough as Long Island stopped the Saint Francis men's basketball team 81-67 on Saturday afternoon at the Wellness, Recreation and Athletic Center.
Felder had his second career double-double with 16 points and a career-high 15 rebounds, and Johnson finished with a career-high 16 points and a career-tying 5 rebounds. Sophomore Umar Shannon (Atlantic City, N.J./Atlantic City) (Atlantic City, N.J. / Atlantic City) had 19 points, 4 rebounds and 3 assists.
However, C.J. Garner had 17 of his 19 points in the final 9:11 of the game to spark the Blackbirds in the second half. Julian Boyd and Jamal Olasewere contributed 16 and 13 points, respectively, and Olasewere also had 10 rebounds.
The Red Flash fell to 2-6 overall with their fourth straight loss, and dropped to 0-2 in the Northeast Conference. The Blackbirds improved to 5-2 overall, and 1-1 in the league.
SFU will now be off for final exams, and will return to action with a non-conference game on Dec. 13, at Lehigh.
“I was very proud of our effort tonight,” said Saint Francis head coach Don Friday. “We certainly didn't give up and we played extremely hard. There are some positives that we can take out of this game. We only had four turnovers in the second half, and we got good contributions from throughout the lineup. Our guys will work hard in the classroom over finals, and we'll regroup for a tough non-conference stretch to finish December.”
After trailing by as many as 13 points in the early part of the second half, the Red Flash battled back to a 43-36 on a layup by Shannon with 15:13 to. Long Island got it back to 13 against with a 5-0 run to make it 53-40 with 12:03 remaining. Saint Francis made one last charge with a 9-2 run, including five straight points by Johnson to make it 55-49 with 9:35 remaining.
However, the Blackbirds went on a 12-2 run to put it out of reach.
Saint Francis led early in the first half, but Long Island used a 14-2 run to take 23-13 lead. The Blackbirds halftime lead was the largest of the half.
Shannon had 9 points and 3 rebounds at the break, while Felder had 6 points and 4 rebounds. SFU shot just 29.4 percent (10-of-34) from the field, while the Blackbirds shot 43.8 percent (14-of-32). The Red Flash had 13 turnovers, but forced LIU into 11.
Boyd had a game-high 11 points at the break, and Long Island had a 24-21 rebounding edge.
Saint Francis shot 38.8 percent from the field (26-of-67), while Long Island shot 44.1 percent (26-of-59). The Red Flash were 12-of-17 from the charity stripe (.706), and the Blackbirds were 25-of-45 (.556).
For periodic men's basketball updates on Twitter, follow Director of Athletic Communications Bob Volkert at SFUVolkert.
