Abington, Pa.- The Penn State Abington men's basketball team returned home from the holiday break with an 84-76 overtime victory over Cairn University Saturday afternoon.
Five minutes into the game, Abington jumped out to any early 11-3 lead. Cairn would cut the Abington lead to just one point at the 10:50 mark of the first half. The Highlanders took control of the remainder of the first half and took a 38-25 lead into the dressing room.
Abington was just 10-for-32 (31.3%) from the field in the first half, while Cairn shot the ball at a 38.9% rate (14-for-36) during the first 20 minutes of play.
After the break, Abington began to assert their offense on Cairn. The Nittany Lions went on a 12-0 run five minutes into the second half to pull even with Cairn at 44-44. Both teams would trade baskets and fouls shots down the stretch to extend the game into overtime.
Coming into the game,
Max Alton (Pennington, N.J.) needed 16 points to reach the 1,000 career point mark. At the 6:47 mark of the second half, Alton would record point number 1,000 on a foul shot. Alton joins his brother Will in the Abington 1,000 point club. The older Alton brother recorded 1124 points from 2009-12.
Alton finished the game with 19 points on 5-of-12 shooting.
Devin Jones (Philadelphia, Pa.) led all scorers with 30 points on 13-of-23 shooting.
Dequan Jackson (Philadelphia, Pa.) added 16 points off the bench on 4-of-5 shooting. Jackson had a huge layup and one to force overtime with three seconds remaining.
The Abington defense would hold the Highlanders scoreless in the extra session and went on an 8-0 run to close out the game.
Abington (2-6, 1-0 NEAC) shot 28-for-66 (42.4 %) from the field, while Cairn shot 28-for-68 (41.2%) from the field for the game. The Blue and White were 20-for-29 (69.0%) from the free thrown line, while Cairn was 17-for-32 (53.1%) from the charity stripe.
Abington will return to action this Tuesday, January 6
th, as they play Gallaudet University at home. Game is scheduled for a 3:00 p.m. tip-off.
