December 7, 2006 - Rider 69 Iona 55
December 7, 2006
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Men’s College Basketball
Rider University 69, Iona College 55
LAWRENCEVILLE—Senior Terrance Mouton (Lafayette, LA/Acadiana) scored 22 points, 17 in the second half, to lead Rider to a Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference victory over Iona Thursday. “Terrance bailed us out in the second half and really caught fire,” said Rider head coach Tommy Dempsey. “He really stepped up when we needed him.”
Holding a 50-47 lead, Rider (6-2, 1-0 MAAC) out-scored Iona 15-4, eight points by Mouton, to take a 65-51 lead with 3:01 left to play. The 22 points tied Mouton’s career high. “We found a way to get it done tonight,” said Dempsey.
The score was tied at 25-25 at half time. Iona (0-6, 0-1 MAAC) took a 31-26 lead before the Broncs went on a 13-3 run, capped by a Mouton three-pointer, to take a 39-34 lead with 13:23 left to play. That was the seventh and final lead change of the game. “Terrance has been playing more of a ‘pass first’ type of point guard this year,” Dempsey said. “Tonight he realized he needed to score when some other guys didn’t have it going. He stepped up and played big in the second half.”
“The shots were open, so I started to take them when I felt we were struggling offensively,” said Mouton. “I was lucky enough to make them.”
“It’s nice to have a senior point guard,” said Iona head coach Jeff Ruland, who had three freshmen guards in his line up. “But give Rider credit. They are a good ball team. Rider is 6-2 for a reason.”
Junior Jason Thompson (Mt. Laurel/Lenape) added 16 points, making eight of 11 foul shots, and eight rebounds. “Iona was clogging the inside, so our guards had some shots and they made some big shots for us tonight,” said Thompson.
Freshman guard Ryan Thompson (Mt. Laurel/Lenape) added nine points and sophomore guard Harris Mansell (Cheltenham, PA) had eight points, while junior forward Joel Green (Philadelphia, PA/Harrison) added nine points.
For Iona, Milan Prodanovic scored 15 points, while Anthony Bruin added 10 points and eight rebounds.
Rider travels to Siena for a MAAC game Saturday afternoon. “We are going to have to play harder than we did tonight if we want to win in Albany,” said Dempsey. “Don’t get me wrong, I know the value of a MAAC win, and I’m very happy we got one tonight. But Iona had 23 offensive rebounds, which tells me they out-hustled us, out-worked us. We can’t get out-hustled or out-worked at Siena and still win the game.”
-RU-
