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Freshman Mike Kernan grabbed seven rebounds in the Skyhawks' 77-62 loss to Merrimack on Saturday. |
North Easton, Mass. - Merrimack freshman guard Darin Mency scored a career-high 29 points and grabbed 10 rebounds to spearhead a hot-shooting Warrior squad to a 77-62 victory over the Skyhawks on Saturday afternoon at Merkert Gymnasium.
The Warriors raced out an early 20-9 lead and had Stonehill down 32-16 before the Skyhawks ran off 12 straight points to trim the lead to 32-28 with 3:15 remaining in the half.
A long triple from Nick Smith (Colonia, N.J./Colonia) had Stonehill within 37-36, but Mency knocked down a triple of his own as the half wound down.
Merrimack opened the second half on a 23-6 run over the first six minutes of the half to silence a loud crowd and push their edge to 62-42.
Stonehill got to within 11 following back-to-back threes from Smith and junior Matt Hall (Springfield, Mass./Central) and a layup from Colin Scanlon (Centreville, Va./Flint Hill), but Mency answered with a putback off of a missed layup, a jumper and then his backcourt mate, Darren Duncan added a off-balance jumper to bump the lead back to 17, at 71-54.
The Warriors shot 50 percent from the floor for the game and connected on 12-of-29 three-pointers.
Chris Winters finished with 14 points, 10 rebounds and three blocks for Merrimack, while Micky Burtnyk added 17 points.
Duncan, who led Merrimack in scoring in the last time these two teams met, finished with seven points, nine assists and six rebounds.
Smith was the lone Stonehill player in double figures, finishing with 22 and seven rebounds.
Hall chipped in with nine points, while A.J. Rudowitz (Monroe Township, N.J./Monroe) added seven points and seven rebounds.
Stonehill, now 16-12 overall and 12-9 in Northeast-10 action, are still in the hunt for a first round bye in the upcoming Northeast-10 tournament. The Skyhawks are tied with Bryant and Pace for fourth, but because of their season sweep of the Bulldogs, they hold any tiebreaker with them.
The Skyhawks return to action on Tuesday when they travel to St. Anselm for a 7:30 p.m. tip.