WILKES-BARRE, PA (January 13, 2020) -- In their final non-conference game of the 2019-2020 season, the King's College men's basketball team held on and outlasted a come back effort to defeat Marywood University, 53-51, on Monday night.

It was a slow game for both teams offensively tonight. Marywood came out scoring the first basket before King's responded with a three by freshman Tyler Faux, both within the first 30 seconds of play. Neither team scored over the next two minutes before senior Josh Bailey broke the drought with five straight points for the Monarchs, as King's led 8-2 with 16:34 left in the first half. The offensive struggles continued as it took another three minutes off the game clock before a Pacer basket by Jake Curnow as the Monarchs answered with a 7-2 run as they led, 15-6 with eight minutes remaining in the opening half. Another scoring drought took up 5:02 of the game clock before the half ended on an 8-6 run in favor of the Pacers, but King's led 21-14 heading into the locker room.

Both teams shook off their poor shooting and started the second half trading baskets before King's built an 11-point lead, 33-22, with 14:20 left. Marywood then used an 11-3 run to pull within three, 36-33, as the game clock read 9:37. The Monarchs answered, building their largest lead of the game, 47-35, off a jumper by senior Joe Lonardi with 6:03 to play, before the Pacers used a big 15-3 run to tie the game at 50 with 1:40 to go. Then a missed jump shot by Faux was tipped over to sophomore Jake Pawliczak by senior Andrew Hudak, and Pawliczak was fouled as he went up with the layup. Pawliczak hit one of the two attempts to take the lead, 51-50, with 20 seconds to play, and Bailey came up big on the defensive end, tipping the ball off the driving Pacer player to regain possession with 15 seconds left and forced Marywood to foul as King's secured the win, 53-51.

King's (7-6, 0-2 MAC Freedom) was led in scoring by Faux, totaling 14 points, six rebounds, and three assists in the win. Sophomore JJ Glinsky came off the bench to provide an offensive burst with eight points on 3-of-5 shooting, including 2-of-4 from three. The Monarchs came up big on the boards tonight, as Bailey totaled 10 boards, Pawliczak added nine, and Hudak recorded six.

Marywood (5-10, 0-2 American East) saw one in double-digits behind an 11-point effort by Curnow, while Adam Boussatta, Tom DeFilippo, and Jason Holman added eight a piece. DeFilippo also pulled down a game-high 11 rebounds in the loss.

As a team, the Monarchs totaled 45 rebounds and dished out 13 assists on their 17-made field goals. Both teams struggled offensively in the loss, as King's shot 17-63 (27.0 percent) and Marywood shot 16-61 (26.2 percent).

The Monarchs are back in action on Wednesday as they host conference newcomer Stevens in the first game of a MAC  Freedom conference doubleheader, starting at 6:00 p.m.