Ant Lessane had 14 points & hit 2 FTs late to seal the win

PLEASANTVILLE, N.Y. (January 22, 2014) – Senior forward Ant Lessane (Brooklyn, N.Y.) hit the go-ahead free throws with under a minute remaining in overtime Wednesday night to lift the No. 21 nationally-ranked Franklin Pierce University men’s basketball team to a 77-76 win at Pace in the Goldstein Fitness Center in Pleasantville, N.Y.

The Ravens won for the third game in a row to improve to 14-2 overall and 9-2 in the Northeast-10 Conference, while the Setters fell to 3-14 and 1-10 in league play.

Franklin Pierce was outstanding defensively in the extra five minutes, limiting Pace to just one basket which came on its first possession seconds into the frame.

That basket, though, did give the Setters a 76-74 lead, and while the Ravens were strong defensively, they could not muster much themselves offensively in overtime.

Senior forward Ellis Cooper (Northampton, Mass.), who was one of four Ravens to log double-figures in scoring with 13 points, converted the first of two free throw attempts moments after Pace’s lone OT field goal.

However, both sides could not convert for the next few minutes until with :39 remaining, Lessane worked his way to the basket for a layup and drawing a foul that sent him to the charity stripe. He sank the first one, and made the second one look even easier to put the Ravens on top by one.

Pace tried to run the clock down for the last shot, but the Ravens held strong inside denying them a chance at a layup as the horn sounded, thus signaling the road win for Franklin Pierce.

Lessane and classmate Adrianos Vourliotakis Perdikaris (Cholargos, Athens) each led Franklin Pierce with 14 points, while junior forward Ryen Vilmont (Philadelphia, Pa.) was the other double-digit scorer with 13. Lessane also had eight rebounds to go with his point total.

Jonathan Merceus led all scorers, as he dropped in 24 for Pace in the setback. Jaylen Mann followed with 16, while Jamaal James and Kai Smith had 15 and 10, respectively.

It was Smith, however, who provided the heroics in the closing seconds of regulation, as he drilled the game-tying three. His triple capped a furious rally by Pace over the game’s final 25 minutes, as the Setters trailed by as many as 17 at one point late in the first half.

In fact, Pace had even clawed all the way back to take multiple 1-or-2 point leads late in regulation. James’ tip-in with 7:08 staked the Setters to a narrow 62-60 lead.

However, Vilmont and Vourliotakis each netted four points to spark an 8-2 run by Franklin Pierce to take a 68-64 advantage.

The game continued to go back and forth from there. Vourliotakis knocked down a pair of free throws and Cooper hit a layup with a little more than a minute remaining to stake the Ravens to a 74-71 lead before Smith drained the huge triple.

The Ravens shot 46 percent from the floor for the game, while holding Pace to under 40 percent shooting at 39 percent.

Franklin Pierce used a balanced scoring attack in the first half and opened up a pair of 17-point leads, including at 38-21 with 4:29 left until halftime. The Setters, though, countered and cut the deficit to 11 at 44-33 heading into the locker room.

Franklin Pierce is back in action this Saturday when the Ravens return home for the first time in two weeks when they play host to Southern Connecticut State at 3:30 p.m. in The Fieldhouse in Rindge.

For more information on Franklin Pierce men’s basketball, please visit the team’s page at http://athletics.franklinpierce.edu. To follow the program even further, please visit Franklin Pierce Athletics on YouTube (www.youtube.com/FranklinPierceSports), Twitter (www.twitter.com/FPUathletics) and Facebook (www.facebook.com/FranklinPierceRavens). Fans wishing to purchase Franklin Pierce men’s basketball apparel can do so on the athletic department’s online store at http://athletics.franklinpierce.edu/store(.)