Blauvelt, N.Y. – Despite getting a 29-point effort from Osbel Caraballo, the St. Thomas Aquinas College Men's Basketball team fell to Dominican College, 95-82 on Saturday evening at the Hennessy Center in Blauvelt.

In the final game of their season-long four-game road trip, STAC took early leads of 2-0 and 5-3 to open first half action. However, Dominican would quickly retake the lead and outscore their opponents 37-31 to take a 40-36 advantage into the halftime break. The Spartans narrowed the Chargers lead to as close as four points early in the second stanza, but DC would keep their foot on the gas pedal and build its largest lead of the contest at 16 with just under eight minutes remaining in the game. Despite several attempts to get back into the game by the visitors, it would be Dominican College who continued to put up points to keep a potential STAC rally from coming to fruition, taking the latest edition of the cross-town hoops rivalry.
 
The aforementioned Osbel Caraballo led the stat sheet for STAC with 29 points and 10 rebounds, while Grant Singleton and Jamal Barnes contributed 14 points apiece. The Chargers were led by Jalen Burgess, who recorded a triple-double, with 23 points, 11 rebounds and 10 assists. Wahaad Johnson (19), Justin Copman (18) and Daniel Grant (15) also finished the evening in double digits scoring.

STAC HIGHLIGHTS AND NOTES:

• Nine different players recorded double-digit minutes in the contest. 
• Demetre Roberts, Grant Singleton and DeVante Jamison led the Spartans with three assists each.
• Osbel Caraballo made 12 of his 17 field goal attempts on the day, with Singleton going 5-for-10.
• STAC scored the game's first basket at 19:10 of the first half on an Elijah Bovell jump shot and extended their largest lead of the game at 5-3 on a Bovell three-point shot 28 seconds later.
• The Spartans were 16-25 (64%) from the field in the first half and 17-37 (45.9%) in the second half.

HOW IT HAPPENED:

• STAC opened the first half with leads of 2-0 and 5-3, before Dominican battled back to go ahead 6-5.
• Despite tying the score twice (9-9 and 17-17), the host Chargers would take a 40-36 advantage into the locker room at halftime.
• Osbel Caraballo paced the offense for the Spartans in the first half, with 13 points, while Justin Copman registered 12 points for Dominican in the opening stanza.
• DC got out to a 46-38 lead to begin the second half, but STAC pushed back and cut the deficit to five just under four minutes into the frame.
• However, the Chargers offense would not let up on the Spartans, as they would outscore St. Thomas Aquinas 49-41 in the final 16 minutes of action
• STAC's bench scored 18 of the team's 82 total points.
• The teams each posted 42 points in the paint.
• Dominican held the edge in points off of turnovers, 23-18. 

UP NEXT: St. Thomas Aquinas (2-2) finally returns to Aquinas Hall to open the 2021-22 home portion of their schedule on Wednesday evening against Goldey-Beacom College. Tip-off between the Spartans and Lightning is set for 7pm in Sparkill.