Box Score SPRINGFIELD, Mass. – Fairfield closed the game on a 17-3 run to come away with as 54-47 victory against Saint Peter's in the Metro Athletic Atlantic Conference (MAAC) men's basketball first round action on Friday.
Desi Washington (Harrisburg, Pa./Central Dauphin) paced the Peacocks (9-21) with 13 points in the loss.
"I think our guys regardless of our record have come out fighting game in and game out and I didn't expect anything else tonight," said head coach John Dunne. "We were in the game and gave ourselves a chance to win in the last two minutes of the game and that is what we wanted."
Derek Needham fueled the Stags (18-14) with 24 points, but it was Amadou Sidibe that came up big down the stretch with four-straight points to power Fairfield to the victory. Sidibe finished the contest with six points.
The Stags closed the game with a 17-3 run to rally from a seven-point lead to come away with the victory and move onto the MAAC Quarterfinals on Saturday night.
Washington gave the Peacocks a 44-37 lead on a 3-pointer with 11:38 left before Fairfield made the decisive run to close out the contest. In the final 11:38 of the game, Saint Peter's shot 1 of 14 from the floor and was 0-for-8 after the Stags tied the game at 46 in the final 5:45 of the tilt.
After Washington gave Saint Peter's its largest lead at seven points, Needham scored the next five points and Barrow added a layup to tie the game at 44 with 7:34 left in the game.
Chris Burke (Willingboro, N.J./Willingboro) regained the lead for the Peacocks on a jumper at 5:45 for a 46-44 lead.
Needham tied the game at 46 on a layup at 2:55 and then the MAAC Co-Rookie of the Year gave the Stags the lead it would not relinquish. Sidibe converted two free throws at 1:49 and then scored in the in the lane with 51.9 seconds on the clock for a 50-46 edge. Fairfield would make four free throws the rest of the to secure the win.
Fairfield jumped out to a 10-point lead in the game before Saint Peter's rallied to take the lead late in the first half, but the Stags went into the locker room with a 27-26 edge.
After the Peacocks used a 15-3 run to erase a 21-11 margin and take a 26-24 lead on a Washington 3-pointer with 1:53 left in the stanza, Needham drained a 3-ball of his own to restore the lead for Fairfield at 27-26 going into halftime.
The Stags jumped out to an early 6-2 advantage in the game and with a 6-5 margin went on a 15-6 spurt to take a 21-11 lead midway through the first half. Marcus Gilbert powered the run with six points.
Saint Peter's answered with a 15-3 run to take the advantage at 26-24 with 1:53 left in the stanza.
Elias Desport (Stockholm, Sweeden/Solna Gymnasium) started the rally with a layup at 8:45. After Needham hit 1 of 2 at the free throw line at 6:10, the Peacocks scored the next six points thanks to two charity tosses by Washington and consecutive jumpers by MarkeseTucker (Trenton, N.J./Trenton Catholic) to make it a 3-point game with 4:04 on the clock in the first half.
Sidibe momentarily halted the Saint Peter's run with a layup, but the Peacocks rolled off a 7-0 run to take its second lead of the night. Blaise Ffrench (Springfield Gardens, N.Y./UTEP) nailed a jumper at 3:09, Raymond scored in the paint at 2:30 and Washington drilled a 3-pointer at 1:53 for a 26-24 margin. Needham then nailed a trey of his own at 1:29 to give the Stags the edge at the break.
Saint Peter's started the second half on a 20-11 run to take its largest lead of the night at 44-37. Washington had five points in the spurt while Desport and Ffrench each had four points in the stretch.
It was after Washington's trey that Fairfield closed the game on the decisive run while holding the Peacocks to one field goal in the final 11 minutes of the contest.
Desport finished the game with a career-high six points.
The contest marked the final college games for Ffrench, Darius Conley (Newport News, Va./Warick), Yvon Raymond (Maplewood, N.J./Nia Prep), Chris Prescott (Bloomfield, Conn./Saint Joseph's) and Karee Ferguson (Willingboro, N.J./Lincoln Trail).
Conley finished his career in a Peacocks uniform with 662 rebounds (eighth in program history), 113 blocks (third in team history) while leaving Jersey City as the all-time leader in games played (122) and third in career starts (111) and finished 975 career points.
