Box Score PURCHASE, N.Y. – The Manhattanville men's basketball team could not shake off Mount Saint Mary in the Valiants' 2013-14 home opener on Tuesday night, falling to their former Skyline Conference rival by an 85-78 score in front of a raucous Kennedy Gymnasium crowd.
 
Senior Colin Campbell (Miami, Fla./LaSalle) and sophomore Anthony Maestre (Bronx, N.Y./Mount St. Michael Academy) combined for 35 points in the backcourt to lead the Valiants. Campbell netting a team-leading 18 with four assists and three steals, while Maestre chipped in 17 points, a team-best five assists and a pair of steals.
 
Defensively, Manhattanville had trouble containing the Knights' Joe Henain, who led all players with 24 points on 11-of-13 shooting and also had a game-high 12 rebounds. Three other Knights reached double figures in scoring, including Chris Pisciotta with 16 points and Donte Howell with 15 points to go with six assists and three steals.
 
Manhattanville can point to free-throw shooting as a major factor in the loss, as the Valiants hit only 13 of 26 attempts from the charity stripe. The team was more impactful from beyond the arc, sinking 11 threes on 24 attempts, and finished the night shooting 48.2 percent (27 for 56) from the field. Mount Saint Mary hit 32 of 62 shots (51.6 percent) from the field, despite misfiring on 12 of its 15 long-range attempts.
 
After Manhattanville scored five of the first nine points to take an early lead, the Valiants had a bad five-minute stretch that allowed Mount Saint Mary to rattle off 16 straight points and take a 20-5 lead with 6:52 gone by in the first half. The home team managed only four shots in the span thanks to seven turnovers, and all four shots were off target.
 
Seven straight points got the Valiants back into the contest and the squad kept the deficit around 10 points before back-to-back threes from Maestre and junior Connor Quigley (Pelham, N.Y./Pelham Memorial) got the lead down to four at 33-29 with 2:26 left before halftime. The Valiants went into halftime down by eight at 40-32 thanks to a 6-of-13 showing from beyond the arc in the first 20 minutes, which helped to counteract 12 first-half turnovers.
 
After a Pisciotta three opened the second half, Manhattanville responded with its best five minutes of the night, going on a 17-6 run that put the home team ahead by a point. Maestre, Campbell and freshman Charles Nardone (Stony Point, N.Y./North Rockland) all hit big three-pointers during the run, which was capped by a three from junior Wills Flynn (Miami, Fla./Westminster Christian) that made it 49-48 with 14:29 remaining.
 
The game was tied on three separate occasions after that point, the last coming on a pair of Campbell freebies that put the score at 64-all with 7:24 on the clock. But the visitors countered with eight straight points to take a 72-64 lead, with Henain (five points) and Pisciotta (three points) keying the run. The Valiants could not get back within a possession the rest of the way, as every score was seemingly countered immediately by a Knight bucket at the other end.
 
Manhattanville will return to action this weekend with the annual AJ Buchanan Classic, when the Valiants welcome Medgar Evers, Eastern Connecticut State and Catholic to Kennedy Gym for a weekend of basketball in memory of their former teammate. The action begins on Friday night with ECSU and Catholic at 6 p.m., followed by Manhattanville and Medgar Evers at 8 p.m.