SALEM, VA--For the second time in as many days, the Roanoke College men's basketball team lost a home game to an Old Dominion Athletic Conference opponent, falling on Sunday to Virginia Wesleyan 78-63. The Maroons are now 9-8 overall on the season and 3-7 in the ODAC. The Marlins, who sweep the regular season series from the Maroons, improve to 14-4 overall and 8-4 in league play.
The Maroons took an early one-point lead, 3-2, with 16:40 to play in the first half, but managed to score just two more points over the next 6:36 and found themselves behind 25-8 with 10:04 left in the first. The Marlins hit five three-pointers in the first 10 minutes of the ball game, the fifth of those coming from Marques Fitch, giving the Marlins the 25-8 lead. A Peter Warren layup with 5:14 left in the half gave the Marlins a 19-point cushion, 36-17. Sparked by two three-pointers of their own, the Maroons mounted a comeback, going on an 11-2 run, and with 2:03 left in the half trailed 38-28.
Tee Jackson (Galax, VA/Carroll Co.) and Jared Butler (Springfield, VA/West Springfield) each hit threes in the run, while Keith Carter (Roanoke, VA/Northside) and Ben Shrader (Tazewell, VA/Mercer Christian) each had layups. The sixth Marlin three-pointer of the half, this one from Rodney Young, pushed VWC's lead back to 13. Shrader cut the lead to 11 with a jumper with less than a minute to play. The Maroons had a shot to cut the lead to single digits, but a missed RC jumper with 10 seconds to play sparked a 4-on-1 Marlin fastbreak, a fastbreak which resulted in a Fitch layup with just two seconds to play in the half.
Peter Warren and Ton Ton Belanga each hit three-pointers for the Marlins in the first five minutes of the second half to push the visitor's lead to 18 points. Minutes later Fitch scored eight consecutive points for the Marlins, six coming on two three-pointers and with 9:54 left in the game the Marlins owned their largest lead, 25 points, 65-40.
Down by 23 points with 7:46 to play, the Maroons trimmed Virginia Wesleyan's lead to just 12 with 3:31 left in the contest. Clint Zimmerman (Morganton, NC/Freedom) made two free throws and hit a long three-pointer in a Maroon 11-0 run. Mike Zurek (Palm Beach Gardens, FL/Suncoast) scored on a layup to make the score 68-56 Virginia Wesleyan's way. After a second Zurek layup kept the VWC lead at 12, Josh LaPorte (Staunton, VA/Riverheads) threw down his second dunk of the half to trim the Marlin lead to 10, 70-60. The Marlins made eight consecutive free throws to end the game.
Five players scored in double-figures for the Marlins, including Fitch who led the way with 16 point. He made four of his team's 10 threes. Brandon Adair scored 15 points and led his team with nine rebounds.
Shrader led the way for Roanoke, scoring 11 points, all 11 coming in the first half of play, when he made all five of his field goal attempts. Jared Butler and Kevinn Hunter (Dale City, VA/Gar-Field) each added 10.
The Maroons are back in action on Wednesday in a home game against the Royals of Eastern Mennonite. The game in Salem, VA begins at 7:00pm.
