LORETTO, PA. ? The Monmouth men's basketball team fell to St. Francis (Pa.), 73-62, in the regular season finale on Monday night, in DeGol Arena. The loss, coupled with St. Francis (N.Y.)'s win over Fairleigh Dickinson eliminated the Hawks from the final Northeast Conference Tournament berth.
After being tied 27-27 at the half, the Hawks surrendered 46 points to the Red Flash in the second stanza, en route to the road loss, as Devin Sweetney and Marquis Ford combined for 24 of those points.
Monmouth finishes the season at 12-18 and 7-11 in the NEC, and loses the final tournament berth to the Terriers on a tiebreaker.
Monmouth jumped out to a 5-0 lead after a Corey Hallett three-pointer to open the game and a Marques Alston basket, but the Red Flash responded with eight straight points to corral an 8-5 edge, capped by back-to-back trifectas.
After the Hawks pulled to within one, 10-9, with 15:20 showing after a Jhamar Youngblood drive, SFU opened a 16-9 lead after Devin Sweetney's offensive rebound and putback. MU reclaimed a lead at 19-18 on an Alston layup and held a 24-22 edge at the 3:48 mark after a Dejan Delic trifecta.
MU played catch-up the remainder of the stanza, finally knotting the score at 27-27 with 2:08 until the break on a Delic drive.
The Red Flash scored the first five points out of the locker room and built a 12-point lead as late as 2:06 remaning.
SFU connected on 51.7% from the floor in the second half and 5-of-10 from beyond the arc.
Alston led three Hawks in double-figures, with 15 points, while Bunch added 14. Delic chipped in 10 points.
