Men's Basketball Battles MCLA for 88-82 Win
North Adams, Mass. - Behind 22 points from senior forward Josue Almodovar (Holyoke, Mass.), the Framingham State College men's basketball team defeated the MCLA Men's basketball team 88-82 on Senior Day in North Adams. The Rams improve to 13-9 overall and 8-3 in the MASCAC with the win and remain in sole possession of second place in the MASCAC standings. With the setback, MCLA falls to 9-13 overall, 3-7 in the league.
MCLA's Jon Greenberg (Antwerp, Belgium) led all scorers with 23
points and 13 rebounds.
The physical contest saw a total of 46 fouls between the
teams. The difference in the game turned out to be the Rams
free throw shooting as they shot 82% from the line (28-34) compared
to 52% for the home team (14-27).
MCLA came out with a lot of emotion as their seniors, Derek Gibbons
(Rochester, Mass.), Mike Perreault (Whitinsville, Mass.), Joey
Paoletti (Orange,Mass.), and Pat Ryan (Woodstock, NY) came out
firing. A Gibbons put back with 14:41 to play in the first
half put MCLA ahead 15-7. The basket started a 12-4 run
giving the hosts their largest lead of the night at 25-11 capped
off by a Brenden Kordana (Adams, Mass.) three pointer with 10:48 to
play in the half.
The visitors would chip away and finally trim the margin to four at
the break, 41-37.
Early in the second half with the score at 46-39 in favor of
the
Trailblazers, Framingham used a 9-2 run to pull even at 48 on Bill
Carey's (Abington, Mass.) three pointer. MCLA would respond
though, using a 9-2 spurt to pull ahead 57-50 with just under 12 to
play.
The Rams once again answered, this time using an 8-0 run to capture
their first lead of the night at 58-57 on an Almodovar lay
in.
MCLA would again take a short lived lead, but the visitors
reclaimed the edge at 71-69 on a pair of Almodovar free
throws. MCLA would battle back to tie the game at 75, but the
Rams ran off six straight points to take an insurmountable
lead.
Framingham would go 6-of-7 from the line to ice the game.
Almodovar led the Rams with 22 points before fouling out and led
four players in double figures. Senior guard Darius Yarrell
(Brockton, Mass.) picked up 18 points, while classmate Brendan
Carter (South Boston, Mass.) picked up a career-high 14 points to
go along with seven boards. Junior Royce Veal (Dorchester,
Mass.) added 12 points.
Aside from Greenberg, MCLA was paced by Perreault's 15 points,
including three from beyond the arc.
MCLA will wrap up the home slate on Tuesday when they host
Fitchburg State at 7:30 p.m., while the Rams travel to Westfield
State on Tuesday at 7:30 p.m.
Release courtesy of MCLA Sports Information.