Box Score BEVERLY, Mass.--Western New England had four scorers in double-digits, led by senior
Dennis Rinaldi's game highs of 19 points and 14 rebounds, but it wasn't enough to offset a solid shooting performance by Endicott in a close 82-76 loss in Commonwealth Coast Conference men's basketball action on Saturday at the MacDonald Gymnasium. The visiting Golden Bears fall to 3-11 on the season and 1-7 in the CCC, while the Gulls improve to 12-3 and 6-2.
Newcomer
Luis Agrait pumped in a career-high 13 points off the bench to join Rinaldi in double-digits, plus teammates
Musa Elsir and
Kevin Wilkes added 11 and 10, respectively.
But despite the balanced offense that also included seven points from
Tizauni Boyles, and six apiece from
Ryan Mickiewicz and
Zack Askew, the Golden Bears struggled shooting the basketball both from the field and at the free throw line. Western New England shot 36.5 percent from the floor (23-63) and had a 65.9 clip at the charity stripe (27-41).
On the other side, the Gulls made 33 of 60 field goal attempts 55.0 percent, including an impressive 58.06 success rate (18-31) in the first half to take a 46-35 lead at the intermission.
Lachlan Magee paced the Endicott offense with 18 points on 7-of-10 shooting, followed by John Henault with 17 and Kamahl Walker had 10. Henault became the 11th player in Gulls history to score 1,000 career points.
Western New England was able to stay close by playing aggressively driving to the basket to generate free throw chances and outmuscling the Gulls on the glass. The Golden Bears enjoyed a 46-33 rebounding advantage, including 21-7 on the offensive end that enabled WNE to outscore EC 22 to 15 in second-chance points.
Endicott, however, also took advantage of scoring 20 points off 15 WNE turnovers.
After trailing by as many as 15 points in the first half, and by 12 as late as the 8:40 mark in the second, WNE was able to close within 60-56 with 57 seconds left in the game, but Endicott was able to hold off the Golden Bears' late surge.
Western New England will look to get back on the winning track at Salve Regina on Tuesday, while Endicott also is on the road against Wentworth.
