ERIE, Pa. – The Slippery Rock University men's basketball team saw its season come to and end Wednesday night with a 77-70 loss on the road at Gannon University in the quarterfinal round of the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference playoffs from the Hammermill Center.
 
The Rock finishes the season with a 21-9 overall record, while Gannon improves to 21-8 and advances to the PSAC Final Four.
 
Slippery Rock trailed by double figures for much of the second half before knocking down six straight 3-pointers in the final 90 seconds and cut the deficit to four points, but Gannon hit its final 10 straight free throws to keep SRU at bay.
 
The Rock outscored Gannon 45-24 from the field over the final 20 minutes, but the Golden Knights were 22-of-24 from the free throw line over that same stretch to go +18 in points from the charity stripe in the second half.
 
Slippery Rock struggled with control early in the game and finished with one of its worst handling games of the year, turning the ball over 17 times and allowing Gannon to score 30 points off those turnovers in what proved to be the deciding factor in the game.
 
The Rock trailed by 10 points at halftime, 31-21, after shooting just 33.3 percent from the field in the first half (8-of-24). Gannon didn't fare much better at 37.1 percent, but the Golden Knights managed to outrebound The Rock by 10 (25-15) and scored 15 points off of eight SRU turnovers over the first 20 minutes.
 
SRU rallied early in the second half with a 10-2 run to cut the deficit to just two points at 33-31, but Gannon answered the run with four quick points in transition and pushed the lead back out to 10 points at 45-35 with 11:10 to play after a stretch that saw The Rock get into foul trouble when guards Merdic Green and Tony Gates both picked up their third and fourth fouls.
 
With the guard lineup rotating early in the second half, the turnover troubles returned and Slippery Rock coughed it up seven times in the first 13 minutes of the half, which Gannon turned into 12 more points off turnovers while pushing the advantage out to double figures.
 
Slippery Rock shot the ball much better in the second half at 56.3 percent (18-of-32) to finish the night shooting 46.4 percent from the field (26-of-56), 47.6 percent from 3-point (10-of-21) and 47.1 percent from the free throw line (8-of-17).
 
Gannon shot 41 percent in the second half and finished the game just 39.1 percent from the field (25-of-64) and 40 percent from 3-point (2-of-5), but the 86.2 percent effort from the free throw line (25-of-29) was enough to offset the poor shooting effort from the field.
 
Micah Till closed an electrifying first year at Slippery Rock with a game-high 27 points and 10 rebounds for his 22nd double-double of the year. His game totals brought his season numbers to 640 points, the third most in a single-season in SRU history, and 361 rebounds, the most in SRU history. Till is the only player in the country with more than 600 points and 350 rebounds in Division I or Division II this year.
 
Brandon Simmons also went for a double-double with a career-high 19 points and 12 rebounds and matched his career-high with five blocks. Simmons' blocks bring his single-season record to 84 blocks, shattering the former record of 68 that was set 27 years ago.
 
Khyree Wooten finished his final game at SRU with 12 points, while fellow seniors Merdic Green and Christal Malalu finished with five and four points, respectively.
 
Gannon was paced by 20 points from Zay Jackson, who made just four field goals, but was 10-of-11 at the free throw line. Damon Miraud finished the night with 10 points and 15 rebounds an Evan Phoenix added 17 points and seven boards.
 
Slippery Rock was appearing in the PSAC playoffs for the eighth time in the 10-year tenure of head coach Kevin Reynolds. The Rock posted their sixth season with at least 20 wins during that stretch.
 
 
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