Tartans Make Season-High 13 Three-Pointers in Setback at #6 Rochester

(ROCHESTER, N.Y.) – The Carnegie Mellon University men's basketball team traveled to the 6th-ranked Yellowjackets of the University of Rochester Friday, February 15 for a University Athletic Association (UAA) contest. The Tartans played the nationally ranked Yellowjackets wire-to-wire before dropping an 81-77 decision.  Carnegie Mellon is now 5-18, 2-10 while Rochester moves to 21-2, 10-2.

With 13 minutes showing on the clock in the second half, Rochester led 56-52, but the Tartans used an 8-1 run over the next 3:30 to claim a 60-57 lead following a trey by junior Asad Meghani (Dallas, Texas/The Greenhill School).  Rochester then scored the next four points to reclaim the lead, but another trey by Meghani gave the lead right back to the Tartans, 63-61.

On the next possession down the court, Rochester's John DiBartolomeo connect on a long ball from the top of the arc to give the Yellowjackets the lead right back and start an 8-0 run that pushed the home team's lead to 69-63 with four minutes left in the contest.

The Yellowjackets grabbed their largest lead of the game a minute later at 73-66, but a made layup by sophomore Seth Cordts (Amherst, N.H./Souhegan) and a pair of foul shots by senior Andre Moore (Bowie, Md./Archbishop Spalding) pulled the Tartans back to within three at 73-70 with 1:35 on the clock.

Junior Rashaun Riley (Houston, Texas/Cypress Creek) drained a three-pointer with 19.9 seconds remaining to pull the Tartans to within two (77-75), but DiBartolomeo converted four straight from the charity stripe to seal the victory for the Yellowjackets.

The first half saw the score tied seven times with four lead changes.  Carnegie Mellon grabbed it largest lead of four points on two different occasions in the frame. The first came on a trey by Cordts to make the score 16-12.  Less than a minute later, junior Rob Mohen (Stamford, Conn./Regis (NY)) drained a long ball to give the Tartans a 19-15 lead.
 
With the score knotted at 37-37, DiBartolomeo connected on a trey with six seconds left in the half to give the home team a 40-37 edge at the break.  For the half, Carnegie Mellon shot 50% (9-18) from behind the arc and 41% from the floor while Rochester shot 54% from the floor and 50% (8-16) from long range.

Carnegie Mellon ended the game shooting a season-best 52% from behind the arc including making a season-high 13.  The Tartans shot 42% from the floor while Rochester shot 47% for the floor and 41% from long distance.

Meghani led the Tartans with 17 points on 6-of-9 shooting and 5-of-7 from long range.  Moore and Riley each made three treys and ended with 16 and 15 points, respectively.  Mohen was the Tartans fourth player in double figures with 14 points.  Moore ended the nigh dishing out a career-high six assists.
 
DiBartolomeo led the Yellowjackets with a game-high 38 points while Rob Reid finished with 12 points.

The Tartans will head to Atlanta, Georgia on Sunday to play Emory University.  Tip is set for 12:00 p.m.