Drew men's basketball held off a second half surge by the Berkeley Bulldogs to win its second game of the season, 77-66, at Baldwin Gym.  The Rangers led by as many as 19 in the second half before the guests cut the lead to four points mid way through the second half.  Drew (2-3) rebounded from the stumble to win going away.  Mike Mayes led four Rangers in double figures with 17 points.  Jarrel Young had 18 points for the Bulldogs (2-6).  The win gives the Rangers some momentum heading into their Landmark Conference opener against USMMA on Saturday.

After back and forth action for the first ten minutes of play the Rangers led by four points, 22-18, before an 18-2 run by Drew increased the lead.  McNeil Wrice got it started with a three from the corner and then a nice feed to a cutting Mehmet Onen for a fastbreak layup.  After a Jarrel Young jumper, jumpers from Terrell Brown, Mayes and Nnamdi Ekezie made it 33-20.  Brown's free throw at 3:23 made it 40-20 to the Rangers.  The Bulldogs would chip away at the lead and Devin Bennett's fast break layup made it 42-29 with 11 seconds left.  Lucas Levenson's layup off Travis DeNapoli's assist with just a few seconds left brought the halftime score to 44-29.

Drew played very well in the half, shooting 64.5% from the field and out-rebounding the Bulldogs 21-6.  Brown had 11 in the half while Kyle Joyce added six points and four rebounds.  Levenson, making his first start of the season, had four points, four boards and two blocks in the first period.

The Rangers went up by 19 with three minutes gone in the second half as Tony Ganter found Mayes back door for a layup.  That hoop would trigger a run, but not the kind that the Rangers hoped for as the Bulldogs scored the next 15 points in the game.  Four points from Donovan Black and three more from Sherone Nelson helped, but it was Young's eight points that made the difference.  Young's second three point play of the run made it 51-47 with 13:17 left to play.

Last year, Kyle Joyce had one of the best shooting seasons in Drew's history as he hit 78 threes to rank in the NCAA's Top 30 in both three-pointers made and three-point field goal percentage.  This season, the junior has struggled from behind the arc, but helped the team in other ways like the eight rebounds he grabbed tonight.  Still, the long ball is his specialty, so when he drilled a triple off Mayes feed to restore a seven point lead there was a sense of relief from the Rangers and not only because of the 54-47 tally.  Tony Ganter hit a pair of free throws to make it nine before the teams traded baskets for the next four minutes of low scoring play.

As has been the case so many times already in this young season, Brown came up with a big hoop.  The sophomore converted a three point play to drag Drew's lead to 61-51 with just under six minutes left.  Levenson made it 11 just a few moments later after he was fouled while grabbing a defensive rebound.  The freshman set a career high with seven boards in the game. 

Drew's defense frustrated the Bulldogs for the rest of the game as the Rangers were able to slowly kill off the game.  Ganter hit a pair of free throws with 2:49 left; Mayes' great driving layup on the break made it 13 thirty seconds later though Young hit a free throw just seconds later to bring the Bulldogs to within 12, 67-55. 

Drew still led by that 12 with 45 seconds left as some bad free throw shooting crippled the Rangers' efforts to put the game away.  Finally, Drew found its range from the foul line and hit its final eight from the stripe to overcome 11 points from Berkeley in the final minute of play.  Travis DeNapoli grabbed the game's final rebound with three seconds left on a 77-66 win.

Mayes had 17 to lead the Rangers along with six boards, three assists and three steals.  Both Brown and Joyce finished with 14 and eight.  Tony Ganter had 10 points, eight from the line, and three assists.  One of the keys to the win was the play of freshman Lucas Levenson.  Levenson had just five points, but added seven rebounds and seven blocked shots in 26 solid minutes.  The seven blocks are the most since Mike Machin's eight against Wilkes on 2/8/03.

Young had 18 and Donovan Black added 15 for Berkeley.  Devin Bennett had six points and 10 rebounds for the Bulldogs, who got 23 points from their bench.

Drew improves to 2-3 on the season with the win ahead of their Landmark Conference opener against USMMA on Saturday at the Merchant Marine Academy.  Berkeley falls to 2-6 on the season.