New London, Conn. - January 20, 2016 - The Springfield College men's basketball team knocked down a season-best 13 three pointers as it picked up a critical 88-77 win at the Coast Guard Academy on Wednesday night in New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) action.

With the loss the Bears drop to 8-7 overall and 2-3 in conference play. The Pride improve to 5-10 on the season and 2-3 as well in NEWMAC competition.

Springfield was led by a trio of veterans as it scored a season-best 88 points on the night.  Graduate student Josh Altman (Rockport, Mass.) hit the 20-point plateau for the fifth time this season as he canned five tripples, senior Josh Downes (East Sandwich, Mass.) had 19 points, six rebounds and three blocks, and senior Larry Piretra (Oakland, N.J.) had 12 points, knocking down all four of his attempts from downtown.

Ethan Boose registered his third double double in a row scoring 22 points and grabbing 10 rebounds, while Darius Adams had his first double double of the season with 17 points and 10 rebounds. Classmate Micah Baldez had 14 points, seven rebounds and six assists while senior Kevin Alvarez scored 18.

It was a close game early on as it was all knotted at 11 as Alvarez took a pass from Adams and laid it in with 15:11 left in the first half.

The Pride then went on a 19-9 run to take a 10 point lead at 30-20 with just under 10 minutes to go in the half. Springfield was 5-6 from three over this stretch, including three from Piretra.

Coast Guard cut it to six with 7:10 left in the first after two free throws from Adams and then a jumper from freshman Bryce Schroeder made the score 35-29.  However, a 9-2 run by Springfield pushed the lead back to double digits at 44-31 and the Pride closed out the half keeping a double digit lead at 49-39 going into the final stanza.

The Bears came out strong in the second half scoring the first seven points and cutting Springfield's lead to three on a layup by Baldez making the score 49-46 with 17:04 on the clock.

Three points however would be the closest Coast Guard would get the rest of the way as the Pride slowly increased its lead, pushing it to as many as 14, closing out an 88-77 victory.  Altman had 12 points in 12 minutes of action in the second half to lead the Pride, which shot 50% from the floor in the half.

The Bears shot 42.2% (27-64) from the floor and 1-14 (7.1%) from three. Coast Guard held an advantage in the paint outscoring Springfield 38-24 but could not overcome the hot three point shooting from Springfield.

Springfield was 30-63 (47.6%) overall and shot a season high 65% (13-20) from beyond the arc.  Springfield will continue league action on Saturday when it hosts Clark.