For the third consecutive season, the Men’s Basketball Panthers will be heading into the ODAC conference tournament.
In the team’s last two contests, they defeated Randolph 93-65 and lost in OT against #23 Roanoke 75-73.
Mother Nature was not on campus’ side last week. With heavy snow and rain, unsafe travel conditions and a power outage resulted in the game being moved twice.
When tip-off finally happened on Sun., Feb. 16, the Panthers were looking for revenge from the team’s last meeting against Randolph which resulted in a 96-89 road loss.
This time things were different, especially on the defensive side of the ball.
Halfway through the first half, the score was knotted at 18 before the Panthers started to break away.
In the next 10 minutes, the team went on a 30-11 run to end the half.
The last time these two squared off, Randolph shot 18-34 from the field. This time around, they only shot 10-32.
When the second half began, the Panthers picked up where they left off, shooting 16-28 from the field.
After the final buzzer sounded, Ferrum saw themselves on a 4-game win streak with the 93-65 win.
The team’s defense didn’t dip in the second half, either. Randolph shot 15-35 from the field and 0-11 from three.
Junior, Gerren Jones led all scorers with 27 points to go along with his five threes.
Senior, Alfredo Abel-Rivera notched himself a double-double with 16 points and 11 rebounds.
Following the win, the team travelled to Roanoke on Tuesday.
To start, Ferrum struggled scoring 27 points on 32% shooting in the first half, trailing by 9 going into the locker room.
In the second half, the team crawled back into the game and eventually tying it up at 53 with 5 minutes remaining.
With less than two minutes to go, Ferrum was down two possessions.
After a made jumper from Jones and a layup from Tae Allen on the following offensive possession, the Panthers tied the game up again.
On the final possession the Panther defense got the stop they needed to send the game into overtime.
Ferrum had two possessions in the final four seconds of the game down by two points but couldn’t find a way to win in the end.
The Panthers fell 75-73, ending the winning streak.
For the third straight season, Head Coach Patrick Corrigan will lead a team into the playoffs.
The last two seasons have seen the Panthers win a first-round game and lose in the second round.
Going into the year, a goal for Corrigan was to make a deep run in this year’s playoffs.
Ferrum will play the 3-seed–Hampden-Sydney–when the tournament begins.
