The Shadow
The Mountain Gateway Roadrunners (0-9) comeback was held off by Northern Virginia Community College Nighthawks (3-9) on Saturday evening.
It was the Roadrunners ninth straight loss to open the season as the Nighthawks prevailed 70-66.
Trailing by eight points at halftime, the Nighthawks built an 11-point lead at the start of the second half following a Markell Johnson three-pointer.
With 18 minutes left in the game, the Roadrunners down 36-25 would play an up and down game with the Nighthawks. The Roadrunners would cut the lead down to four points and then quickly the Nighthawks would build the lead back up to nine points.
The biggest takeaway was that the Roadrunners were closing the gap.
In a span of 10 minutes, the Roadrunners would go on a 26-15 run as they tied the game at 51-51 following a Jake Korbakes three-pointer.
The Roadrunners momentum wouldn’t carry over, as Johnson would knock down two of Nighthawks next three baskets to rebuild a six-point lead at 57-51.
Korbakes drained a three-pointer that cut the lead down to three points.
The Nighthawks would go on a 9-2 scoring run to retake a double digit lead thanks to a pair of layups from Adric Howe and another three-pointer from Johnson.
Down 10 points with three minutes left the Roadrunners scored eight straight points to close the gap to a one possession game. Korbakes scored four of those points as the Roadrunners chipped away with free-throw shooting.
With a one possession game and working to run the game clock down as far as they can, Lorenzo Snyder hit a dagger three-pointer to put the Nighthawks up five points with 17 seconds remaining.
In the loss, Korbakes led all scorers with a game-high 24 points for the Roadrunners. Zion Shirley scored 15 points, while Donovan Amason added 13.
The Nighthawks had four players in double figures scoring, including A. Howe who had a team-high 15 points, while Cedric Howe added 14. Meanwhile, Terrell Neal put together a double-double with 11 points and 11 rebounds.
The Roadrunners will look for their first win of the season today as they are on the road against Southwest Virginia Community College.
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Men’s College Basketball
Nighthawks at Roadrunners
Team 1st 2nd Total
NCVV 31 39 70
MGCC 23 43 66
Nighthawks Stats
Player Pts Reb Ast Stl
Morales 4 6 0 1
Woni 2 2 0 1
Farley 0 4 0 0
Johnson 12 7 1 3
Scriber 0 1 0 0
A Howe 15 4 6 2
Snyder 10 3 3 3
G Howe 14 6 1 3
Neal 11 11 5 1
Stinger 2 4 0 0
TOTAL 70 52 15 13
Roadrunners Stats
Player Pts Reb Ast Stl
Korbakes 24 4 0 1
Brown 8 10 4 5
Amason 13 7 4 0
Shirley 15 3 0 2
Cruz 6 12 1 0
Wood 0 3 1 0
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TOTAL 66 40 10 8
