Men's Basketball | 2/3/2009 10:48:53 PM

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ROCHESTER, NY – The RIT men's basketball team (15-4) clinched a berth in the 2009 Empire 8 Postseason Tournament and moved to 11-0 in conference play after knocking off the visiting Alfred Saxons (7-11, 2-7 Empire 8) 75-58 at the Clark Gym on Tuesday evening.

The Tigers are now 11-0 in Empire 8 play for the first time in program history.  RIT has won seven straight games and is 11-1 in the 2009 calendar year.

RIT opened the game on a 29-7 run over the first 9:18 and never looked back. Alfred cut the Tigers lead to 13, at 35-22 on a pair of free throws by Jared Patt with 6:14 left in the half. RIT got the lead back to 18 shortly thereafter on a jumper by #Marcus Lowe (Anchorage, AK/Service)# (Anchorage, AK/Service), a pair of made free throws by #Scott Young (Almond, NY/Hornell)# (Almond, NY/Hornell) and a thunderous dunk by Brendan Harder (Oneonta, NY/Oneonta) (Oneonta, NY/Oneonta).

RIT went into halftime with a 44-28 lead on the strength of 53 percent shooting from the field.

Shawn Roe (Corning, NY/Corning East) (Corning, NY/Corning East) led the way for RIT with a career-high 20 points on 6-of-9 shooting from the field. All six of his made baskets were 3-pointers. He scored 14 of his 20 points in the first half. 

Harder poured in a career-best 10 points on 5-of-5 shooting from the field. He also added eight rebounds, four assists and two blocks. Lowe was 5-of-7 from the field en route to 10 points.

Nate Korinchak (Strongsville, OH/Strongsville) (Strongsville, OH/Strongsville) dished out a game-high six assists and added two steals.

Senior center Mark Carson (Voorheesville, NY/Voorheesville) (Voorheesville, NY/Voorheesville), who leads all of NCAA basketball (Division I, II and III) in rebounds per game, notched his 16th double-double of the season, with 13 points and 11 boards in just 21 minutes of play. Carson had 10 points and eight boards by the midway through the first half, but played sparingly the rest of the way due to foul trouble.

Carl Embury led Alfred with 18 points. Jared Patt and Mike Stopera added 12 points apiece.

RIT shot 48 percent from the field and out-rebounded the Saxons 42-32. Both teams had 14 turnovers. Alfred shot just 32.7 percent from the floor and made 5-of-28 (17.9 percent) from 3-point range.

RIT leads the all-time series against Alfred, 57-35.  On Dec. 1, Carson scored 26 points and added 12 rebounds in a 56-52 RIT win at Alfred.

RIT stayed a game up in Empire 8 play after Ithaca moved to 10-1 in conference when they defeated St. John Fisher, 75-66.

The Tigers return to action on Friday, as they host SUNY Cobleskill in a non-league contest starting at 7 p.m.