MBB falls to West leading Mont Alto
The Penn State Fayette men's basketball team celebrated Senior Day Saturday by hosting Pennsylvania State University Athletic Conference West champion Mont Alto, but it dropped a hard-fought 76-69 contest.
Despite the loss, Fayette coach Andy Hedrick was impressed with what he saw from his team, especially early.
"We played the best basketball we have played all season during the first half," he said. "We played good defense and took away things they hurt us with earlier this year. In the second half, we only scored 27 points and went through long periods of not getting buckets."
Fayette (10-13 overall, 6-11 PSUAC) took the lead in the first half, led by as many as 15 points and opened up a 42-29 lead at halftime, but Mont Alto (21-3, 16-1) used a 47-27 second half advantage to earn the win, the 16th in its past 17 games.
Mont Alto shot 42.4 percent (28-66) for the game while Fayette shot 41.7 percent (25-60). Fayette made nine of its 30 three-point attempts (30.0 percent) while Mont Alto made five of its 20 attempts (25.0 percent). The guests made15 of 22 free throw attempts (68.2 percent) while Fayette made 10 of its 14 attempts (71.4 percent) from the line.
A big difference was the turnover department. Fayette's 22 turnovers led to 29 Mont Alto points while Fayette scored 18 points off of Mont Alto's 11 giveaways. Mont Alto also had big advantages in points in the paint (44-26) and bench points (24-7).
Mo Freeman (New Castle, DE/Salem Community College) led Fayette with 21 points and tied Will Hagwood (Willoughby, OH/Willoughby HS) with a team-high 11 rebounds. It was Freeman's second double-double of the season.
Dasilas Jones (Fairmont, WV/Fairmont HS) added 20 points for Fayette and Tave Mozie (McClellandtown, PA/Albert Gallatin HS) finished with 13. Caleb Eckert came off the bench to lead Mont Alto with 22 points.
Mozie and Freeman, the two seniors on the team, played their last home game Saturday.
Fayette concludes its regular season with two road games this week. It is at Penn State Shenango (8-19, 4-13) Monday before closing its season at Penn State Beaver (14-9, 11-6) Thursday. Playoff seedings will be announced once the regular season concludes.
For more information on the men's basketball team, go to https://www.psfathletics.com/sports/mbkb/index or follow us on Instagram @fayetteathletics