Box Score

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WORCESTER, Mass. - Navy senior forward Worth Smith scored his 1,000th career point, but the visiting Midshipmen (7-13, 3-5 PL) suffered a 76-65 loss at Holy Cross (8-10, 3-5 PL) on Saturday afternoon at the Hart Center. Navy dropped its fourth straight game since opening conference play at 3-1.

Navy shot 50 percent from the floor (19-of-38) and 64 percent on 3-pointers (7-of-11), but the Crusaders shot an even higher percentage from the floor at 58 percent (25-of-43), while also scoring 23 points off of Navy's 15 turnovers.

"I thought the first 10 minutes of the game we played very well on both ends of the floor and got a nice lead," head coach Ed DeChellis said. "Then the speed of the game caught up with us in the last six minutes of the first half and they went on a big run and we didn't have answers for them defensively. We shot the ball very well today, but we still got beat pretty handily because we couldn't defend the ball. We had 15 turnovers too, which is the most we've had in a long time."

Navy had a great start to the game, hitting its first four shots to jump out to a 10-3 lead after 3:13. Senior guard Brandon Venturini and junior guard Tilman Dunbar hit jumpers, and then Venturini drained back-to-back 3-pointers.

Navy took an 11-point lead at 20-9 after Venturini hit his third 3-pointer of the half. Holy Cross started to rally, but another Venturini triple put the Mids ahead 25-18. Holy Cross then fought back to tie the game at 25-25 after two free throws by Malachi Alexander.

Smith hit a pair of free throws to give Navy a 27-25 lead, but Holy Cross closed the half on a 13-4 run that included a 40-foot buzzer beater by Justin Burrell as the Crusaders took a seven-point lead into halftime at 38-31.

Navy committed eight turnovers in the final 7:15 of the first half.

Holy Cross carried the momentum from the Burrell buzzer beater into the second half, opening on a 13-2 run that saw the hosts pull ahead by 19 points. Navy was able to respond with an 8-0 run that cut the deficit to 11 points at 52-41. Smith surpassed the 1,000-point mark on reverse layup with 11:02 left and junior center Will Kelly made four straight free throws to key the Navy run.

Holy Cross would then take control of the game and extend its lead to 18 with a 12-5 run with five minutes to go. Navy's reserves slowly chipped away at the margin and three late 3-pointers (two by Zach Fong and one by Nourse Fox) cut the final deficit to 11 at 76-65.

Alexander went 10-of-13 from the free throw line to lead Holy Cross with 17 points. Malcom Miller added 15 and Burrell finished with 12.

Venturini scored 14 points in the first half for Navy and finished the day with 16. Smith and Kelly each had eight points while Fox finished with a career-high seven points.

Smith became the 21st player in school history to surpass the 1,000-point mark. Venturini currently has 942 career points and is just 58 points away from joining Smith in the 1,000-point club.

Venturini made a 3-pointer for the 28th straight game, which is the third-longest streak in school history.

Navy got a big boost at the free throw line in the second half as the Mids connected on 15-of-21 in the period and was 20-of-27 in the game overall (74 percent).

Navy will next host American on Wednesday at 7:00 PM. The game will be produced by Campus Insiders and will be streamed on PatriotLeague.TV.