The Men's Basketball team hosted the Nationally Ranked Hawks from Mohawk Valley on Wednesday night. The Raiders stunned the Hawks with a big 87-86 victory on a game winning three-pointer from Donovan Rodriguez. FMCC moves to 10-3 over all and third in the Region 3 standings, behind Herkimer and Genesee.
Mohawk Valley opened the game on an 11-4 run. Max Pritchett drilled two foul shots to put the Raiders ahead 12-11 with 14 minutes in the first half. Donovan Rodriguez got his hot shooting started at the 10-minute mark with a three to go ahead, 21-17.
Jordan Jackson sank a three with five minutes to play in the first half and the Raiders led by 9. MVCC ended the half on a 7-0 run and FM headed into the locker room with a 44-38 lead.
The Hawks came out fast in the second half and took the lead, 49-48 with 16 minutes to play. Both teams battled basket for basket and the Raiders re-gained the lead 64-60 with 10 minutes left.
With 45 seconds remaining, FMCC was down 78-84, but Rodriguez drilled a three to set the score at 81-84. He would hit another three with 13 seconds to go and they trailed by just 1 point. MVCC missed a foul shot and here came the Raiders.
Jordan Jackson was fouled on an offense rebound with 2.6 seconds to go. He missed the first free thorw of a one-and one and the rebound was kicked out to Rodriguez for the game winning three.
Donovan Rodriguez finished with 33 points and shot 8-9 from deep with three of them coming in the last 45 seconds. Kennyh Hardeman tallied 19 points and 12 rebounds. Nahjhime Kirton and Schumel Shepherd chipped in with 12 each.
"We are as focused as we were last year on getting better each game and each week hopefully all leading up to being at our best in the regional tournament and hopefully national tournament. Any win is a good win, we just try to go one game at a time. Donovan had been in a little bit of a shooting slump which happens to the best shooters in the game, but what a way to break out of it, really happy for him and my guys. Now on to Saturday," said Coach Ej Gallup.
The Raiders are back hardwood on Saturday when they travel to take on Jefferson Community College. They will be back at home on Sunday, January 28th against Tompkins Cortland at 3pm
