Nov. 18, 2007

Final Stats

BRIDGEPORT, CT - The Sacred Heart men's basketball team built a 14-point lead in the first seven minutes against Fairfield University on Sunday night, but with 4:30 left in the half the lead had evaporated and the Stags used that spurt to beat the visiting Pioneers 84-75 in the first-ever meeting between the two schools.

Sacred Heart, 0-4, came out hot and used five three-pointers, three from sophomore Corey Hassan (Merricmack, NH) and two from sophomore Chauncey Hardy (Middletown, CT), to build the early 21-7 lead. A combination of eight SHU turnovers and some strong offensive rebounding allowed Fairfield to tie the score at 31-31 with 4:30 left. The Stags then outscored the Pioneers 11-4 down the stretch to lead 42-35 at the intermission.

The closest the Pioneers would get in the second half was at 64-60 on a jumper by freshman Mehmet Sahan (Istanbul, Turkey) with 8:30 left in the game. Fairfield then used a 7-2 mini-spurt to open the lead back up to 71-62 with 4:35 left, capped by a pair of free throws from Jonathan Han.

The Pioneers had one last run and a Brice Brooks (Silverdale, WA) bucket with 3:39 to go had SHU back within four at 71-67. However, a Pioneer foul resulted in two more free throws for Fairfield. The a Brooks missed layup turned into a Fairfield basket by Greg Nero and Fairfield ws back up 75-67 and coasted to the finish with its second win of the year.

Han led all scorers with 22 points, including a nine-of-ten performance at the line. Nero finished with 21 points. Anthony Johnson added ten and a game-high 11 rebounds.

Hardy led the Pioneers with 19 points, while Drew Shubik (Stoystown, PA) had 14. Hassan finished with 11, despite missing the last ten minutes of the game with an injury. Brooks had ten points and a team-best six rebounds.