Penn State Scranton Men’s Basketball Falls to Red Hot Mont Alto

By: Ross Turetsky, Penn State Scranton Athletics

On a hump day in the electric city, an undermanned Penn State Scranton men's basketball squad dropped a home conference tilt to Penn State Mont Alto 79-54. With their second straight defeat, Scranton's overall record falls to 5-10 and in the all-important conference play they are now 2-7 on the season. Meanwhile, Mont Alto stayed piping hot, as they are now on a nine game winning streak and have a stellar overall record of 14-2 and 9-1 in league play.

After taking a short lived 21-20 advantage about mid-way into the first half, Scranton was able to stay very competitive at the break despite being down 41-28 to their stiff opposition. However, in the second half, Mont Alto pulled away and never looked back, as they outscored Scranton 38-26 in the final 20 minutes of game action to clinch their dominant 25 point road triumph at the end of play. A key factor in Mont Alto's victory was their lethal shooting, as they were dynamite from the field with a 52.5 percent to 31.5 percent heavy advantage lighting up the scoreboard.

Scranton had only one scorer put up double digit points, as newcomer Blake Masker provided a much needed spark coming off the bench and scored a team-high 13 points in his 19 minutes on the court, to go along with sinking two of his five attempts from beyond the three point arc, three steals, two assists, and five rebounds. Other key contributors were senior Salim Wyche who had nine points and four boards, senior Savion Saunders who put up eight points in his 23 minutes, and last but certainly not least, freshman Vincent Talluto came off the bench and led the team with seven rebounds.

Mont Alto had two integral performers who scored in double digits and had the bulk of their squad's points, as senior Quintyn Flemister and junior Darrius Bush combined for 46 of the 79 points their team had. Bush scored a game-high 24 points on a solid 8-15 shooting from the field, knocking down 6-10 from three point range, and helped out with two boards, and three assists in his 32 minutes on the floor. Finally, Flemister was almost equally as impressive, scoring 22 points on 8-13 shooting from the field, hitting on five shots from beyond the arc, and tallying seven rebounds, three assists, and three steals in the contest.

Now head coach Chris Sload and his Penn State Scranton men's basketball club will look to get back into the win column in their next game this upcoming Saturday, January 22^nd, when they host conference rival Penn State Lehigh Valley with a 3pm tip-off. Meanwhile, head coach Jack Schenzel and his elite Mont Alto squad will look to improve their win streak to 10 straight games when they host conference foe Penn State Shenango this Saturday with a 4pm start.