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ERIE, Pa. – The Slippery Rock University men's basketball team fought back from a 14 point halftime deficit to take a late lead, but LeMoyne closed the game on an 8-0 run to score a 60-55 victory in non-conference action Saturday at the Gary Miller Classic at the Hammermill Center in Erie.
 
The loss was the second overall for the season for Slippery Rock and the first in non-conference action. The Rock drops to 4-2 overall, an admirable start to the season considering four of the six opponents were NCAA Division II playoff qualifying teams last year. LeMoyne improved to 6-1 overall with the slim victory a night after defeating Gannon 47-45.
 
A slow start for Slippery Rock would ultimately be its undoing as The Rock mustered just 14 points on five made field goals in the first half. LeMoyne wasn't much better, but still posted a 28-14 halftime advantage.
 
Slippery Rock opened the second half with a 12-2 run to cut the deficit to four points, but the Dolphins responded by pushing the lead back out to 12 points at 38-26 with 14:09 to play.
 
From there, The Rock took over with a 20-8 run to tie the game at 46-46 with 8:07 to play and actually took the lead on three occasions inside the final 10 minutes, the last time coming with 4:41 to play when Kelvin Goodwin knocked down a 3-pointer to make it 55-52.
 
Unfortunately for Slippery Rock, that would mark the final offensive basket of the game as LeMoyne went on an 8-0 run over the final 4:41 to seal the 60-55 win.
 
Slippery Rock finished the game shooting 32.8 percent from the field thanks to a 44.1 percent effort in the second half after shooting just 18.5 percent in the first half. The Rock made 20-of-61 attempts from the floor, including 15-of-34 in the second half. SRU was 34.8 percent from 3-point (8-of-23) and 77.8 percent (7-of-9) at the free throw line.
 
Goodwin led the way with 19 points. Antonio Butler added 14 points and seven rebounds to finish with 37 points in the two-game tournament. His effort was good enough to earn a place on the five-player All-Tournament team. Cornelius Brown added seven points and seven rebounds, Jamal Gatali chipped in six points and four rebounds and Malcolm Richardson scored five points to cap the top performers.
 
Bench scoring came at a premium Saturday as only five total points of the 115 scored came from reserve players and all five of those were from Rock reserves. LeMoyne got all 60 points from starters, led by 22 from Qwadere Lovell. Nate Gause added 19 and Connor Mahoney scored 10.
 
The Dolphins shot 53.3 percent from the floor (24-of-45), 33.3 percent from 3-point (4-of-12) and 57.1 percent from the free throw line (8-of-14). Slippery Rock finished with a slim 33-32 edge in total rebounds.
 
Saturday's game marked the final regular season neutral court game for Slippery Rock and the final non-conference game against an NCAA opponent. The Rock will host non NCAA member Ohio University Eastern twice before the new year, but the remainder of the schedule will be Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference contests.
 
The PSAC action resumes Wednesday, Dec. 3, when Edinboro visits Morrow Field House for an 8 p.m. tip.