WILKES-BARRE, PA. – The Manhattanville College men's basketball team closed the season with two straight victories in 2018-19. The Valiants finished off with a season sweep of Middle Atlantic Conference (MAC) Freedom conference foe King's College (Pa.) and defeated the Monarchs 64-62 on the road Saturday afternoon, Feb. 16.
 
Sophomore Sean Smith, Jr. (Yonkers, N.Y./Sacred Heart), closed out the year with his 14th double-double of the season and led all players with game highs in points (17) and rebounds (12) in the win for Manhattanville (11-14, 5-9 MACF) against King's (4-21, 2-12 MACF).
 
Neither team managed to pull away in the first half and the squads were within one point at 31-30 in favor of the Valiants at the end of the half. Eventually, Manhattanville was able to grab hold of some momentum for a while midway through the second when the Valiants went on an 8-0 run to take a game-high eight-point lead at 56-48 with 7:06 remaining. Rookie Jake Dunn (Staten Island, N.Y./Monsignor Farrell) kicked it off with a fastbreak layup at 8:43, followed by a pair of free throws from Smith at 7:47. Sophomore Mike Granda (Monroe Township, N.J./St. Joseph) then drilled a three at 7:10 and sank a free throw following a Monarch technical at 7:06.
 
Eventually, King's slowly closed the gap down the stretch but the Valiants were able to fend off the home squad en route to the season-ending victory.
 
Highlights:

• Granda finished with 16 points with all of his field goals coming from long range (5-of-13).
• Rookie Matt Bielenda (Wethersfield, Conn./Xavier) finished with 10 points and eight rebounds.

 
Head coach Pat Scanlon's squad finishes the season with double-digit victories for the 12th time during his tenure atop the program, which has now closed out 15 years. Overall, he now has 198 career victories at the helm of his alma mater and will look to reach the 200 plateau early on in 2019-20.