Boxscore

SLIPPERY ROCK, Pa. – Slippery Rock's Maron Brown hit a 3-pointer with 10 seconds remaining to give The Rock an 82-80 victory over Mercyhurst College in both teams' Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference Western Division opener. 

It marks the second straight year that SRU (12-2, 1-0 PSAC West) outlasted Mercyhurst (10-4, 0-1 PSAC West) in the divisional opener. 

SRU's starters scored all 82 points, with Jabril Bailey posting a game-high 31 points and Brown adding 23 tallies. Maurice Douglas rounded out The Rock double-digit scoring effort with 13 markers. 

For the Lakers, three players scored in double-figures, led by 19 points from Jordan Armstrong and 17 markers from Heiden Ratner. Christian Cornelius also aided the Lakers with 12 points for his second-straight double-digit effort. 

Brown's 3-pointer capped a back-and-forth battle in the final two minutes that was representative of the game.
 
Trailing 46-38 at the half, the Lakers came out of the locker room on fire, hitting eight of their first 10 attempts to pull within one point, 56-55, with 13:58 remaining. Jason Snow's old-fashioned three-point play on the lay-up and free throw tied the game at 12:23 before Slippery Rock reclaimed a brief two-point lead on Bailey's jumper. 

Then, at 10:59 the Lakers Jordan Armstrong jumper in the paint spurred a 7-0 run that was capped by a Shelton Jackson 3-pointer with 10:02 remaining, giving Mercyhurst a 65-60 advantage. 

The Lakers lead grew to four on Ryann Bradford's bucket at 8:47, but the Mercyhurst offense ran into a dry spell, going without a field goal for nearly the next six minutes. 

Jackson connected on both free-throws shortly thereafter to give the Lakers their largest lead of the game, 69-63, with 8:31 left. 

However, momentum started to sway in the hosts favor as Mike Evans, Jr., hit a 3-point at 8:08 and The Rock would eventually begin an 8-0 run after a pair of Bradford free throws. 

The Lakers finally broke the field-goal drought when Heiden Ratner made a 3-pointer at 2:23 to knot the game at 74-74. Ratner finished with 17 points, including five 3-pointers. 

The two teams traded points over the next minute, with Ratner hitting two free-throws for his final points and a 78-78 tie. 

The Rock's Andre Tarver then missed the first free-throw shot but rebounded to hit the second free-throw and give SRU a 79-78 advantage with 52 seconds. 

Then, the Lakers Christian Cornelius threw down a dunk with 26 seconds remaining to give Mercyhurst its first lead, 80-79, since holding a 71-69 advantage at the 7:36 mark. 

The Rock led 46-38 at halftime, primarily relying on the 3-point attack as SRU made 7-of-15 from behind the arc to finish the opening stanza hitting 15-of-34 field goals (44.1 percent). 

Ironically, the Lakers opened the scoring with a 3-pointer by Nnadili, but hit just three long-range shots in the half to finish 4-of-12 from behind the arc. 

The two teams battled back-and-forth for most of the opening stanza, exchanging leads seven times.
The game remained close until The Rock went on an 11-0 run just after the midpoint for its largest lead at 4:50.
However, the Lakers used an 11-2 run of their own in the next two minutes to close the gap to 36-34 before they faced another offensive cold spell and did not hit a field goal until Cornelius' layup with 19 seconds remaining. 

Mercyhurst returns to action on Saturday, Jan. 16 when the Lakers host 12th-ranked IUP at 3 p.m.