CARLISLE, Pa. – Saturday afternoon's rally from a double-digit deficit by the Haverford College men's basketball team fell just short as host Dickinson College held on for a 68-65 Centennial Conference victory.
The three-point loss to the Red Devils was the second in-a-row by the Fords (11-11, 8-8 CC) who dropped their conference game to visiting Ursinus College Wednesday night by the same margin.
Against Dickinson (13-10, 11-5), the Fords were 10 back at the half, 12 down with 6:32 to play and eight points behind with 1:38 on the clock before rallying to nearly pull out the win.
Cam Baker's three-pointer trimmed the margin to five with just under 90 seconds remaining. After a Dickinson miss and Sam Permutt rebound, a Red Devil foul sent Louis Cipriano to the free throw line where he sank the second of two shots to pull Haverford within four.
With under 30 seconds to play the Fords fouled Dickinson's Pat Kearns who missed the front-end of his one-and-one and Permutt, who registered a game-high 12 rebounds in the loss, came down with the ball again. Ian Goldberg drained a three from beyond the arc after a quick push up court to bring Haverford to within two at the 15 second mark.
The Fords fouled again but this time Dickinson took advantage of the free throws as Matt Dolan nailed both to extend the host's lead back to four.
Not ready to give up yet, though, Haverford got another three-pointer from Baker with three ticks remaining but Dolan ended the come-back by sinking both free throws after a Fords foul on the in-bounds play.
Goldberg led all scorers with 19 points while Baker contributed 12. Adam Honig netted 18 points for the Red Devils and Dolan added 13 which included his four clutch free throws down the stretch.
Dickinson, who never trailed in the game, earned an edge over the Fords with 11 second-chance points and 18 points off turnovers compared to just four and 10, respectively, from Haverford.
With the loss, Haverford falls into a three-way tie with Muhlenberg College and Ursinus for the fifth and final spot in the conference tournament which begins Feb. 23.
The Fords square off with Muhlenberg in their next outing, a Wednesday night match-up in Allentown, before closing out the regular season at home in a Sat. Feb. 19 show-down against visiting Swarthmore College.