Moon Township, Pa. - Nursing a 43-41 lead with 5:49 to play, the Robert Morris University men's basketball team used a 17-3 run to surge past No. 8 seed Monmouth Thursday night, 64-50, in a 2008 Northeast Conference Tournament quarterfinal game at the Charles L. Sewall Center.
RMU, which notched its 14th straight win, improved to 26-6 overall on the season and will host No. 4 seed Mount St. Mary's Sunday, March 9, for a 3:00 p.m. contest that will be aired live on FSN Pittsburgh. The Hawks finish their season with a record of 7-24.
Senior guard Tony Lee (Boston, Mass. / Charlestown), named the 2008 NEC Player of the Year Wednesday, scored 10 points during the deciding run for the Colonials. He scored seven straight points, including a three-pointer, to push Robert Morris ahead, 47-41, and back-to-back three-pointers from junior guard Jeremy Chappell (Cincinnati, Ohio / Northwest) and Lee gave the Colonials a 53-44 advantage with 2:57 to play.
RMU sealed the victory at the free-throw line, hitting nine of its 11 opportunities in the final 2:23 of action. Monmouth owned a 30-28 lead with 14:47 remaining after James Hett converted a three-point play thanks to a foul by Chappell. Sophomore guard Mezie Nwigwe (Hyattsville, Md. / High Point) answered with a jumper to tie the score, 30-30, and after Dutch Gaitley hit one of two tries from the charity stripe, the Colonials took the lead for good, 33-31.
The big bucket came courtesy of sophomore guard Jimmy Langhurst (Willard, Ohio / Willard), who buried a three-pointer at the 13:25 mark of the second half.
Monmouth jumped out to a 12-4 lead in the first six minutes of action as six different Hawks scored. The lead remained eight, 18-10, with 6:25 left in the first half after a jumper by Nick DelTufo, but a 7-0 Robert Morris surge closed the Colonials within one, 18-17.
Langhurst hit a three-pointer, while senior center Freddie Harris (Decatur, Ala. / Lawson State C.C.) and freshman guard Gary Wallace (Montclair, N.J. / Seton Hall Prep) each scored layups.
Gaitley hit a pair of free throws to give Monmouth a 20-17 lead, but Chappell knotted the game, 20-20, with a three-pointer with just 1:23 left before halftime. The Hawks owned a 23-20 edge with less than a minute to play in the stanza, but RMU was able to take the lead at the break, 24-23, thanks to solid defense and free throws.
Harris converted a pair at the charity stripe with 21 seconds left before halftime, and after a steal by junior guard Bateko Francisco (Paris, France / Fort Scott J.C.), Lee's pair of free throws with 10 seconds remaining gave the Colonials the lead at intermission, 24-23.
Neither club led by more than three in the opening eight minutes of the second half, but a pair of free throws from senior forward A.J. Jackson (Monessen, Pa. / Monessen) edged the Colonials ahead, 35-31, with 11:11 to play. It was part of an 8-0 surge that gave Robert Morris a 38-31 lead with 10:13 remaining. Monmouth cut its deficit to two on a pair of occasions with under seven minutes to go before RMU's deciding run.
Lee and Langhurst paced the Colonials with 15 points each, while Yaniv Simpson took home game-high honors in scoring with 18 points for the Hawks. Lee and Langhurst each hit four of their nine shots from the field, while Langhurst was a perfect 4-for-4 from the free-throw line. Neither team shot well, as Robert Morris converted 33.3 percent (17-for-51) of its shots, while Monmouth finished 15-for-48 (31.3 percent).
