EWING, N.J. – The TCNJ men's basketball team picked up an impressive win on Senior Night, holding off a second-half charge from visiting Rutgers-Newark for a 72-59 decision on Wednesday night.
 
The Lions honored fifth-years James Beckwith and Jason Larranaga before the game and never trailed during it, salvaging a season split with the Scarlet Raiders.
 
TCNJ earned the No. 5 seed in the NJAC Tournament and will travel to No. 4 Ramapo for a quarterfinal matchup on Saturday.
 
FOR THE RECORD

• The Lions ended the regular season at 17-8 overall and 11-7 in the NJAC, while Newark dropped to 12-13 overall and 8-10 in the league

HOW IT HAPPENED

• Beckwith broke the game's only tie with a deep 3-pointer to give the Lions the lead for good at 5-2, and the hosts ran it out to 12-4 following five straight points from Matthew Okorie
• Newark got within two twice, but the Lions nailed a 3-pointer on the other end both times, the first from Beckwith and the next from fifth-year counterpart Larranaga to make it 24-19 with 8:43 to go in the first half
• Okorie made a sequence of big plays late in the half, scoring inside on a nice feed from Matthew Solomon before poking the ball away on the other end and flying for an alley-oop lay-up from David Alexandre to extend the lead into double digits at 35-24
• After a Newark three-point play, Alexandre got a twisting, spinning layup to fall plus the foul, and his three-point conversion made it 38-27 at intermission
• The Scarlet Raiders began to impose their will after the break, eventually whittling the TCNJ lead all the way down to two (44-42) with 12:23 to go
• Solomon tipped in his own miss before setting up Jonathan Okocha and Okorie with back-to-back assists to restore some breathing room at 50-42, but Newark got back within three at 50-47
• Okorie came up with a huge three-point play to double the advantage, and later Solomon and Koch scored back-to-back buckets to make it 61-51 with 4:35 remaining
• Newark got it down to single digits twice more, but Beckwith's dagger 3 with 2:03 left stretched the margin to 67-55

FOR THE FOES

• Levi Holton had a big double-double with 19 points and 13 rebounds
• Kelvin Marshall was the only other Newark player in double figures with 12

STANDOUT LIONS

• Okorie topped TCNJ with 17 points and added six rebounds
• Koch posted 15 points and five rebounds
• Solomon notched his 13^th double-double of the season with 14 points and 12 rebounds and also handed out five assists
• Beckwith finished with 11 points and five boards, and Larranaga had six points and four rebounds

INSIDE THE BOX SCORE

• TCNJ shot 45.0 percent for the night (27-for-60), including 22-for-39 (56.4 percent) inside the arc
• The Lions converted 15 Newark turnovers into 21 points, including a 13-0 advantage in the first half
• TCNJ held Newark under 40.0 percent (25-of-64, 39.1%) from the field and just 3-for-15 from 3-point range
• The Lions' rim protection was elite, with Larranaga (4) and Solomon (2) accounting for six of the team's seven blocked shots between them

NOTES

• Solomon surpassed 250 rebounds for the year, the 14^th such season in TCNJ history. He also moved into the top-20 all-time with 383 career boards
• Koch moved into 11^th in single-season school history in assists (111) and also eclipsed 500 career points

UP NEXT

• The Lions head to Ramapo on Saturday for a quarterfinal showdown. The teams split their regular-season series, each winning on its home floor