FINAL STATS

Staten Island, NY – Fifth-year senior guard Justin Drummond (Baltimore, MD/ McDonogh) poured in a career-high 23 points, fifth-year senior guard Joey Mundweiler (Olathe, KS/ Olathe East) added 12 and senior forward Llew Radford (Newport News, VA/ Heritage) pulled down a game-high 10 rebounds to carry Wagner to a 70-65 win over Mount St. Mary's.

The Seahawks played with a palpable sense of urgency in front of a frenzied crowd of 1,204 in keeping their hopes of qualifying for next month's NEC Tournament alive. Wagner is now back to .500 at 13-13 overall, 5-10 in NEC while the second-place Mountaineers fell to 16-11, 11-5 in conference play.

The second half was a nip-and-tuck affair that featured four ties and six lead changes, A Drummond jumper tied the game at 53-53 with 9:55 left in the game. An 8-2 Seahawks spur, capped by a banked runner in the lane by Mundweiler gave Wagner a brief six-point lead at 61-55 with 6:48 to go. The Mountaineers scrapped back with a 7-2 run to tie it on a Jean Cajou three-point jumper from the top of the key with 2:02 left.

Radford then gave Wagner the lead for good as the bruising 6-4, 230-pounder scooped up a loose ball in traffic and in the lane and laid it in off the glass to give the Seahawks a 65-63 lead. Redshirt sophomore guard T.J. Czeski (Amsterdam, NY/ Amsterdam) (career-high nine points) sank both ends of a one-and-one opportunity with 58 seconds left to extend the lead to 67-63. A lay-up by Shawn Atupem, who led the Mount with 15 points cut it to 67-65 with 47 ticks remaining. Fifth-year senior forward Jamal Smith (Baltimore, MD/ Towson Catholic) then made one-of-two free throws with 18 seconds left to make it 68-65.

With three fouls to give before going into the bonus, Wagner aggressively fouled the Mount three times in an 11-second span, setting up an inbounds play from behind the Mountaineer basket. Guard Jeremy Goode, who had 14 points for the Mount, lobbed the ball towards midcourt but a leaping Kelly Beidler was unable to throw the ball off of Smith's leg as he was falling out of bounds, resulting in a turnover.

Drummond was fouled on the ensuing possession with six seconds left and he missed the front end of a one-and-one but was able to corral his own miss and was fouled again with two seconds left. He then calmly made both free throws to seal the 70-65 victory.

Wagner played a crisp first half in taking a 36-35 halftime lead. Drummond had 12 to pace the Seahawks while expertly directing his team as the Seahawks turned the ball over just two times in the entire half.

Wagner won the rebounding battle 31-27 and out-shot the Mount by a slim 48 percent-47 percent.

After vanquishing second-place Mount St. Mary's, Wagner now hosts first-place Robert Morris on Saturday at 7:00 pm.

NOTES – Prior to the game, the Wagner College Athletic Department honored long-time Supervisor of Officials Edgar Cartotto prior to the game. Smith entered the Wagner all-time top-20 in scoring with 1,220 career points. Mundweiler has now played in 119 career games, No. 1 on the all-time Wagner list, surpassing former teammates Mark Porter and Durell Vinson who played in 118 games. Drummond's previous career high was 18 vs. Yale on Dec. 6