Ahmad Clark scored a game high 23 points on Sunday afternoon in leading his Albany Great Danes to a 66-60 win over the Maine Black Bears in America East men’s basketball action at the Cross Insurance Center in Bangor.
Both teams held a lead in the first half, with the visitors from Albany holding the biggest of 10 at 29-19 with 5:45 left. After trailing early on Maine took their first lead 9-8 on a Stephane Ingo layup. The Bears led by as many as four. The hosts would later in the half rally from that 10 point deficit and take the lead back again when Sergio El Darwich capped off a 15-4 run with a three pointer to make it 34-33. Clark though knocked one in from three-point range just before the buzzer to give the Great Danes a 36-34 lead at the break.
Albany (14-12, 7-4 America East) ran off the first six points of the second half to up the lead to eight. After falling behind by 11 on two different occasions, Maine would stay within striking distance. El Darwich hit two from the line and then a jumper with 6:04 to play to cut it to 56-55, but Clark and the Great Danes were just too tough down the stretch. Trey Hutcheson and Cameron Healy both hit three-pointers to push the lead back to seven, and later Clark hit a jumper and two free throws in the final 1:30 to finish off the Black Bears.
Clark added nine rebounds to go along with his game high point total in the Albany win. Hutcheson was the only other Great Dane in double figures finishing with 11 points and four rebounds. El Darwich led Maine in the loss with 18 points and six rebounds. Andrew Fleming, Ja’Shonte Wright-McLeish, and Nedeljko Prijovic each had 10 points. Fleming added seven rebounds, while Prijovic had four. The Black Bears drop to 7-18, 3-9 America East and are at Stony Brook to battle the Seawolves next Saturday.
