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University of New Hampshire Athletics
University of New Hampshire
3-2
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Dartmouth College
1-3
Men's Basketball Gets Past Dartmouth 65-63 at the Last Second; Dion Drops 23 Points in Back-To-Back Games
11/30/2014 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
HANOVER, N.H. –Sophomore Daniel Dion (Cedar Park, Texas) buried a running left handed shot with 3.6 seconds left in regulation to lift the University of New Hampshire men's basketball team to a 65-63 win over Dartmouth College from Leede Arena Sunday afternoon.
With the win, the Wildcats improve to 3-2 on the season and Dartmouth slips to 1-3 on the year.
The win at Leede Arena marks the first road victory of the season for New Hampshire.
Three Wildcat players hit double figures by outshooting Dartmouth 24-22 in the paint and earned 14 points off turnovers compared to their opponents nine.
Dion led the squad with another terrific performance from the floor posting 23 points as he was 9-for-15 from the field and was 4-for-9 from the three-point line.
Junior Ronnel Jordan (San Antonio, Texas) was 7-for-9 from the field contributing 15 points while freshmen Tanner Leissner (Converse, Texas) chipped in 13. Leissner shot 80% from the free-throw line (8-for-10).
Dartmouth's forward Connor Bohem led the Big Green with 14 points as Alex Mitola followed with 13. Mitola was 4-for-7 from beyond the arc.
The Wildcats got on the board first with Dion's bucket beyond the arc to go up 3-0 at 19:40 to open up the game. Dartmouth won the tip-off and Boehm missed a jumper to get the game underway.
Halfway through the first half, the Big Green were up 14-11. At 8:49, Jordan nailed a three-pointer to make it 14 all.
Darmouth went on a 4-0 run at 4:49 to go up 20-16. With 2:39 left, Jordan collected a rebound for UNH and on the ensuing possession, his layup notched things up at 21.
Freshmen Iba Camara (Dakar, Senegal) got a rebound off of the glass and seconds later followed with a layup with seven seconds left to play in the first half to cut the deficit 26-35 at the half.
At the half, Dion rattled off 11 straight Wildcat points thanks to a trio of three-pointers.
The second stanza was anyone's game as points were exchanged on both sides of the court until the very end.
The only four-point lead for either team the rest of the afternoon came on a layup by Gabas Maldunas to put the Big Green up, 52-48, with 7:19 left. In those final seven minutes, the lead changed five times, beginning with a Jacoby Armstrong (Sacshe, Texas) layup with 4:30 to go for a 53-52 New Hampshire lead.
Dartmouth's Boehm tied the score at 60 with 1:36 to play, backing in on the post and banking in a one-hander off the glass. With the shot clock winding down, Jaleen Smith (Freeport, Texas) managed to throw up a prayer that found its way through the hoop to put UNH on top by two with a minute to go.
The Big Green were unable to answer back and forced to foul sending Leissner to the line to shoot two. His first was off the mark, but he sank the second for his 13th point as UNH claimed a 63-60 lead. Seconds later, But Mitola drained a three-pointer to tie the game with 19.1 seconds showing on the clock.
After Coach Herrion called a timeout, Dion took control of the ball beyond the top of the key, drove outside the left of the lane and threw up a floater that fell through with 3.6 seconds remaining. The Big Green's Malik Gill did everything he could do to push the game to overtime but his shot missed the mark.
New Hampshire shot 48.1 percent (25-of-52) for the game, but just 30.0 percent (6-of-20) from downtown, while Dartmouth canned half of its threes (8-of-16) and 46.8 percent overall (22-of-47). At the line, the Big Green took more trips but converted just 61.1 percent (11-of-18), while the Wildcats sank 64.3 percent (9-of-14).
The 'Cats are back in action on Wednesday, Dec. 3 (7 p.m.) at LIU Brooklyn. UNH's next home game is Saturday, Dec. 6 (7 p.m.), against Wheelock College.
To purchase tickets for the upcoming season, visit UNHWildcats.com/tickets or call (603) 862-4000, ext. 5.
For the latest news and information on the UNH men's basketball program, check out UNHWildcats.com.
