Pride's Career-High 19 Points Lead Green to First Win

Saturday, November 28

Hanover, N.H.

7:00 p.m.

Dartmouth College

1-4

HARTFORD

2-4

Hartford

Dartmouth

Pride's Career-High 19 Points Lead Green to First Win

11/28/2009 8:30:00 PM | Men's Basketball

Box Score

By: Dartmouth

Boxscore

HANOVER, N.H. — Senior guard Robby Pride poured in a career-high 19 points to lead the Dartmouth men's basketball team to a 68-56 triumph over visiting Hartford at Leede Arena on Saturday night. Both sophomore David Rufful and junior Clive Weeden posted career highs as well with 15 and 12 points, respectively, to help the Big Green (1-4) earn their first win of the young season. The Hawks fell to 2-4 on the year as they lost their second straight game.

Pride had six field goals in nine attempts, including a career-best three trifectas, to lead four Big Green players in double figures. Rufful was 5-of-10 from the floor while Weeden hit 4-of-8 as Dartmouth shot a season-best 45.7 percent (21-of-46). The Green had a sizable advantage at the free throw line as Hartford fouled late in hopes of making a comeback, hitting 20-of-28 (.714) compared to 4-of-8 (.500) for the Hawks.

The Dartmouth defense was even more impressive than the offense, holding a strong-shooting Hartford squad to 35.9 percent (23-of-64) from the floor and just 22.2 percent (6-of-27) from long range. The Hawks entered the game shooting over 47 percent in their first five games, and better than 40 percent on three-pointers. Forward Morgan Sabia led Hartford with 13 points and seven rebounds, but leading scorer Joe Zeglinski managed just four points as he hit 2-of-13 field goals and missed all eight three-point attempts.

The Big Green took control of the game in the middle of the first half and never relented. Pride dropped in a pair of free throws to give Dartmouth the lead at 7-6, while Rufful scored the other seven of the Green's first nine points. Dartmouth would never trail again in the game.

Pride was the offense for the next five minutes, scoring 10 straight points for the Big Green as they built a 19-10 advantage after his second three-pointer. But Hartford clawed its way back to even with three buckets from reserve forward Kevin Estes and a triple by Andrew Torres.

After sophomore Jabari Trotter and Estes traded layups, Dartmouth tallied the final six points of the half. Weeden hit the last two shots of the half for his first points of the night as the Big Green took a 27-21 lead into the locker room.

The Hawks scored the first points after the intermission on a Milton Burton jumper before Dartmouth ripped off a trio of three-pointers — one each by Trotter, junior Ronnie Dixon and Rufful — to open up a 13-point bulge with less than four minutes gone from the second stanza. A couple of minutes later, Pride drained his third trey of the night for boost the lead to 14 at 41-27.

When the lead dwindled to 10, Pride drove the lane for a left-handed layup. Again the Hartford deficit was cut to 10, only to have Weeden hit a jumper and a pair of foul shots. Trotter, who was the fourth Big Green player in double figures with 11, canned two free throws and answered a Burton layup with one of his own.

The lead reached as much as 18 with 1:54 to play, but some missed opportunities at the line allowed Hartford to keep its slim hopes alive. As Dartmouth converted just 2-of-6 free throws in one stretch, the threes suddenly started falling for the Hawks. Sabia nailed two and Torres added another before Burton popped one to quickly make it an eight-point game at 60-52 with just over a minute to play.

But the Big Green righted themselves at the charity stripe, connecting on their final eight attempts to clinch the victory.

Dartmouth enjoyed its first rebounding advantage of the year as well, 36-32, with Weeden grabbing a game-high eight while freshman Matt LaBove grabbed seven in just 12 minutes.

Dartmouth returns to action at Leede Arena on Tuesday, Dec. 1 when it hosts Vermont (2-4) at 7 p.m. Hartford returns to Connecticut to play another Ivy League team in Yale on Wednesday evening at 7 p.m.