March 5, 2011

Box Score

BRIDGEPORT, Conn. - The ninth-seeded Marist men's basketball team had its season come to an end with a 55-31 loss to top-seeded Fairfield on Saturday in the quarterfinal round of the 2011 Spark Energy Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference Men's Basketball Championship at Webster Bank Arena at Harbor Yard. Red-shirt freshman swingman Anell Alexis (Hillsborough, N.J.) led the Red Foxes with 11 points, eight rebounds, four steals and a blocked shot.

Alexis played 29 minutes off the bench, and shot 5-for-9 from the field. He was the lone Red Fox to score in double digits.

Derek Needham paced Fairfield with 22 points, six steals, three rebounds and an assists. Needham shot 8-for-17 from the field and 4-for-9 from three-point range.

Fairfield forced 26 Marist turnovers on the day, and outrebounded the Red Foxes 41-28. Marist shot just .293 (12-for-41) from the field and .273 (3-for-11) from three-point range.

Points were at a premium early in the contest. Fairfield's Ryan Olander opened the scoring with a basket at the 18:26 mark of the first half, but the score remained there until a layup by the Stags' Colin Nickerson at the 14:14 mark. Fairfield scored the game's first six points before a three-pointer by sophomore guard Candon Rusin (Surf City, N.C.) made the score 6-3 at 13:19. The Stags opened up their lead to 13 as they took a 27-14 halftime lead.

With exactly 12 minutes to play, a layup by red-shirt freshman forward Menelik Watson (Manchester, England) cut the Red Foxes' deficit to nine at 32-23. But that was as close as the Red Foxes would get, as Fairfield answered with an 11-0 run over the next 5:54. The 24-point margin of victory was also Fairfield's largest lead of the game.

Marist ends the season at 6-27 overall; Fairfield improved to 24-6.