Box Score

Albany, NY (Dec. 7, 2011) – The Purchase College men's basketball squad continued its winning ways in conference play Wednesday night with a 65-63 win over The Sage Colleges, getting two last-second free throws from D.J. Smith (JR/Saugus, CA) to seal the victory.

Now unbeaten at 3-0 in the Skyline Conference and 5-2 overall, the Panthers were led by John Pressley (JR/New York, NY), who had 17 and 3 assists, while Amar Reynolds (JR/Bronx, NY) added 16 points and two assists. Smith finished with 14 points, six assists, while Elon Howard (SR/Brooklyn, NY) came up big with nine rebounds a six blocked shots.

The game see-sawed back-and-forth with six ties in the first half, which ended tied at 32-32 apiece. The second half also swung back-and-forth with six ties and no one taking a more than four-point lead (Purchase at the 7:19 mark).

The game came down to the Panthers' Smith getting fouled with just two seconds to go and he calmly sank both free throws to put Purchase ahead. A missed shot by the Gators at the buzzer gave the Panthers the win.

Purchase shot 43.9 percent from the field and was 8 of 13 from the line. They posted a 35-34 edge in rebounds.

Sage (3-4 overall and 1-2 in conference play) was led by Ian Austin-Michaud, who had 20 points and just missed a double-double as he had a Gator-leading nine rebounds. Dalton Austin-Michaud added 15 points and nine boards, while Pat Lanoue and Ryan Sager each added 10 points each.

Purchase returns to action Saturday when they take on non-conference foe Baruch College at 2 p.m. at Baruch. The Panthers then take off for the holiday break before returning on Dec. 30 to host William Patterson in a non-conference game that starts at 1 p.m.

-Sage Sports Information Contributed to this report