Harrisonburg, VA - The Mounties traveled to Virginia this weekend to play in the Eastern Mennonite Classic. The Mounties played two highly competitive games, but lost both in close fashion.

On Friday night, The Mounties took on Bridgewater College. The Mounties jumped ahead early, scoring the first 7 points of the contest on two putback layups from Tommy Pisula (Scottdale/Southmoreland) and a lay up from Imrane Amadou (Cotonou, Benin/Harcum Junior College). The Mounties finished the half with only 19 points, but their stingy defense held Bridgewater to only 18.

The second half of the game was a different story as the Mounties, who only had 7 players dressed due to injuries, seemingly ran out of gas in the final five minutes of play. Bridgewater was able to take the lead after a 3 pointer from Liam Caswell and never looked back as they 20-10 run to finish the contest.

Julian Stover (Washington, DC/Richard Montgomery) and Nate Christian (Accokeek, MD/Surratsville) led the way for the Mounties with 14 points a piece. Josiah Jones (Gaithersburg, MD/Magruder) chipped in 9 points from beyond the arc and Tommy Pisula finished with 9 points and 13 boards. 

The Mounties came right back on Saturday afternoon, as they took on the host, Eastern Mennonite to close the trip to Virginia. They played a tight game against the hosts, but were unable to earn the victory, falling by a score of 62-59.

The hosts slowly built up a 7 point lead over the first 7 minutes of the contest, however the Mounties used an 8-0 run over the next 4 minutes to take the lead. The run was capped off by Christian jumper that led to an EMU timeout. The two teams battled back and forth for the remainder of the first half, as the teams exchanged 5 lead changes over the final 9 minutes of play to go to the break with a score of 28-26 EMU. The Mounties were never able to take back in the lead in the second half, as they traded baskets with EMU for the majority of play. 

Stover led the Mounties again, this time finishing with 21 points, including making 4 of his 7 shots from three point range. Christian chipped in 17 points in the loss, while Amadou recorded a double-double finishing with 11 points and 12 rebounds.

The Mounties (1-3) will have a week to recover from their 4 games in 6 days stretch. Their next contest will be at home on Sunday November 25th, when they host McDaniel College. The game will start at 2:00 PM in the ACWC.