COLCHESTER, Vt. - Sophomore Jeremiah Mordi scored a team-best 21 points, while senior forward Khalil McDonald opened up the 2011-12 campaign with a double-double of 18 points and 10 rebounds Saturday afternoon at Ross Sports Center, as the visiting Queens College men's basketball team used a game-ending 16-4 run to top Saint Michael's College in both teams' season opener, 70-64.
The Knights (1-0) scored the first six points of the afternoon on back-to-back triples by senior Edil Lacayo (Bronx, N.Y.), and made 14 of their first 20 field-goal attempts to start out. Up 18-11 after Mordi (Valley Stream, N.Y.) canned a jumper, the host Purple Knights (0-1) scored the next 13 points of the showdown to go up by six with eight minutes remaining in the opening half. Junior Daniel Watson (Mt. Vernon, N.Y.) sank a pair of trifectas as part of a 10-2 spurt to push Queens back in front by a 35-32 count, and QC went into the locker room at halftime up 37-36.
The teams switched the lead back-and-forth a total of six times in the second half, with SMC taking a 60-54 lead with 7:23 to go on a pair of freebies by Mike Holton, Jr. From there, Knights sophomore Pat Piasecki (Coram, N.Y.) canned a pair from the charity stripe, and McDonald (Queens Village, N.Y.) added a 20-footer and a 3-ball - kick-starting a game-ending 16-4 run and pulling the visitors within a 62-61 count. Freshman point guard Abe Akanmu (Staten Island, N.Y.) banked home a driving lay-in with 4:10 left to put Queens in front for good, and the Knights made seven-of-eight free throws in the final two minutes to ice the contest.
Akanmu came off the bench to register six points, seven rebounds and a game-high six assists for QC, which only turned the ball over on three occasions in the second half. The Knights' defense also limited the Purple Knights to a .345 field-goal percentage on the day.
Head coach Kyrk Peponakis's Queens team is back in action on the road next Saturday (Nov. 19), when they travel to Easton, Mass., for a 2 p.m. tip-off at Stonehill College.
