ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. - Florida Southern College men's basketball held on for a 66-63 Sunshine State Conference road win against Eckerd College Saturday afternoon at the McArthur Center.
The Moccasins snapped a four-game skid and improve to 6-9 overall on the season and 3-4 in the SSC while Eckerd falls to 2-9 and 0-5 SSC.
"I am really proud of our guys today," said Head Coach
Mike Donnelly. "It was a great team win."
Donnelly continued, "Due to our constant lineup changes, we had to adjust our game plan last minute and our guys did a really good job listening and executing."
E.J. Dambreville paced the Moccasins (6-9, 3-4 SSC) with a season-high 27 points, one shy of his career-high, where the redshirt junior guard made nine shots on the night from the field with five three's and four free throws, going 4-for-6 night from the free throw line. He completed his sixth double-double of the season with 10 rebounds in a full 40 minutes of action.
In back-to-back games, redshirt freshman guard
Dominick Denny reset his career-high with 14 points in 34 minutes of action against the Tritons. Denny made six buckets on the night with a pair of three-pointers. Graduate student guard
Jack Casale notched a double-double with 12 points and 13 rebounds, his season-high in boards this year.
Pierce Kiesler scored a season-high 10 points to round out the double-digit scorers for the Mocs.
Eckerd opened up the scoring and remained in front for the first half of the first period before
Dominick Denny converted a layup for the Mocs' first lead of the night, 15-14. The two teams traded the lead over final 10 minutes of the half.
Pierce Kiesler's layup and
E.J. Dambreville's three-pointer allowed FSC to hold a four-point advantage prior to the Tritons' Gianfranco Grafals scored a layup with five seconds left in the half; FSC 37-35.
Florida Southern raced out of the gates of the halftime break and opened up a double-digit lead, 52-41, with 11 minutes to play and to its largest lead of 13 at the 10:33 mark. The Tritons would battle back and cut it to just a single possession with under four minutes to play. Dambreville and Denny would combine for five points to keep the Mocs in the lead with three minutes on the clock. Eckerd's pressure and clutch free throw shooting down the stretch would get the Tritons within one, with 21-seconds to go 64-63. Dambreville would knock down a pair of free throws a second later, 66-63, and it would prove enough as Eckerd went 0-for-3 in its final three attempts of three-pointers in the closing seconds.
UP NEXT
Florida Southern returns home after two road games to host Saint Leo University on Wednesday inside the George W. Jenkins Field House with a scheduled tip-off approximately at 7:30 p.m.
