Box Score PHILADELPHIA, Pa. – La Salle defeated Saint Peter's 59-50 in the first game of the Barclays Classic in non-conference men's basketball action on Saturday.
Elisha Boone (Laurelton, N.Y./Abraham Lincoln) paced the Peacocks (0-4) with a career-high eight points and nine rebounds off the bench while Marvin Dominique (Miramar, Fla./Miramar [Fordham]) tallied nine points and nine rebounds in the loss.
Jordan Price fueled the Explorers (3-0) with 21 points while Amar Stukes added 11 points and Jerrell Wright recorded 10 points and 12 rebounds in the winning effort.
La Salle stormed out to the advantage and Saint Peter's closed the gap a couple times, but the Explorers earned the win in a reunion of former Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference foes from the 1980's to early 90's.
La Salle jumped out to an 11-0 lead and a 14-2 advantage in the first seven minutes of the game.
Price and Wright started the string of 11 unanswered points by converting two charity tosses apiece at 17:22 and 15:35. Stukes then scored in the lane at 16:15 and Roberts made a trey at 14:35 before Wright slammed home a dunk at 14:19 for an 11-0 advantage.
Boone got the Peacocks on the scoreboard at 14:01, but then Price drained a triple at 13:21 for a 12-point lead.
The Peacocks answered with a 10-2 run over the seven minutes to trim the margin to 16-12 with 5:14 on the clock. After Dominique started the spurt with a jumper at 12:56, Tyler Gaskins (Roswell, Ga./Centennial [Lawson State]) and Jamel Fields (Albany, N.Y./Cheshire Academy [Fairfield]) scored in the lane at 7:09 and 6:46 to trim the score to 14-8.
Wright momentarily halted the Saint Peter's momentum with a layup, but Dominique and Trevis Wyche (Neptune, N.J./Saint Peter's Prep) made a pair at the line to cut the deficit to four points with 5:14 left in the stanza.
Thanks to a pair of traditional 3-point plays by Cleon Roberts and Stukes, the Explorers scored eight of the final 10 points to go into the locker room with a 23-14 lead.
La Salle extended its advantage to 16 points midway through the second half. Saint Peter's trimmed the margin to nine points with 7:47 left after a Boone free throw and again after a Dominique layup with 60 seconds left. Fields hit a 3-pointer with 35.1 seconds left to make it an eight-point game, but the Peacocks could get no closer.
Saint Peter's got at least seven points from five different players. Along with Dominique's nine points and Boone's eight points, Wyche and Fields each had a season-high eight points and Chazz Patterson (Brown Mills, N.J./Trenton Catholic) added seven points. Dominique did not record double figures in a non-conference game for the first time in his Saint Peter's career.
Quadir Welton (Philadelphia, Pa./Math, Civics and Science Charter) returned to his hometown for the first time in his collegiate career, finishing the game with one point, five rebounds and one block.
The Peacocks were playing their second game in a 39-hour stretch after battling Niagara on Thursday night in Jersey City.
Saint Peter's returns to action on Tuesday at Rutgers as part of the Barclays Classic. Game time is 7 p.m. It will be the first game against the Scarlet Knights since the Peacocks opened the 2012-13 season with a 56-52 win.
