By: JONATHAN TEN EYCK
It has been a frustrating season for the (7-7) St. Lawrence University Men’s Basketball team and that continued Saturday. Coming off a win over Union College ,the team could not overcome (5-11) Rensselaer in a game where the Saints struggled to stop the three.
After staying with Rensselaer for the first half, despite allowing them to shoot 66.7% from beyond the arc with 6-9 shooting, the Saints fell in a 14 point hole as Rensselaer went on a 12-0 run to start the second half. Rensselaer was able to take advantage of the suddenly anemic Saints offense as they held the Saints without a basket for the first 6 minutes of the half. A basket by Jeremy Mendrick ’18 stopped the run and the Saints were able to come back within striking distance to Rensselaer behind a strong second half effort from Brady Condlin ’15 and Kyle Edwards ‘17.
The key to this comeback was a schematic shift by head coach Chris Downs to switch to an aggressive full court press on defense. This shift seemed to reenergize the team, who tied the Engineers with 2:27 left to play when Kyle Kobis ’17 channeled Kyle Korver and made the Saints only three of the second half to bring the score to 62 all. That would be it for the Saints however as they would not be able to muster another basket while Rensselaer’s leading scorer Josh Dugas capped off his 15 point game with what proved to be the winning basket. The Saints were unable to tie up the game, despite chances for Edwards and Kobis, and Rensselaer was able to make several free throws to put the game away.
The Saints were lead in scoring for the day by Brady Condlin ’15 who finished with 17 points on 6-12 shooting, assists by Willie Zachery ’17 who had 4, and in rebounds by Condlin and Edwards who each had 6. The Saints now travel to Vassar College and Bard College next weekend before coming back home to Burkman Gym to take on rival Clarkson on the 27th.