WALTHAM, Mass. – The Brandeis University men's basketball team shot a season-best 58.3% from the field (35-60) today as they scored a season-high 86 points behind five double-figure scorers in an 86-75 win over UMass Boston in Red Auerbach Arena today.

TEAM RECORDS

• Brandeis, 3-4.
• UMass Boston, 2-5.

HOW IT HAPPENED

• The Judges and Beacons played a back-and-forth game in the first half, with four ties and four lead changes.
• Senior Jake Bender (Hope, R.I./St. George's School) made his season debut and helped the Judges build their largest lead of the first half at seven points, hitting a lay-up and a 3-pointer on back-to-back possessions, then feeding sophomore Alex Zakheim (Bergenfield, N.J./Perkiomen, Pa.) for a trifecta off an offensive rebound that made the game 20-13 with 10:39 to go.
• UMB stuck around and went on a 19-9 run that gave the Beacons a 32-29 lead when Raphel Laurent hit a 3-pointer.
• Laurent scored with 40 seconds left to give the Beacons a 39-37 lead, but Bender answered on the other end as the teams went into the locker room tied at 39.
• First-year Gur Dhillon (Frisco, Texas/Brewster Acad., N.H.) and Zakheim led the Judges with nine points each, while Laurent (16 points) and Cameron Perkins (15 points) scored 31 of the Beacons' 39 points before the break. Both teams shot better than 50% in the stanza – 58.1% to 55.6% in favor of the Judges.
• The hands stayed hot in the second, with Perkins scoring the first four points of the half to give the Beacons a 43-39 lead. He connected on a 3-pointer to extend the visitors to their largest lead at 49-44 with 2:10 gone in the second.
• Dhillon answered with the game's next five points to tie things up at 49, and a steal and bucket by Zakheim gave Brandeis a 51-49 lead just 1:09 later.
• Brandeis extended that lead back to six on a 3-pointer by junior Ali Kaan Bek (Istanbul, Turkey/Koc School) that made it 62-56 with 12:04 on the clock.
• UMass Boston wouldn't go away, scoring seven unanswered, with a dunk by Perkins kicking things off and a Laurent lay-up giving the Beacons a 63-62 lead with 11:04 left.
• Brandeis went on a decisive 9-0 run at that point. The Judges scored the first three points from the line, then graduate student JJ Hayes (Hilton Head, S.C./Hilton Head Prep) had a lay-up and a put-back that surrounded a Zakheim bucket as the hosts saw their lead balloon to 71-63 just three minutes later.
• After some back-and-forth, UMB was able to close within three on a Perkins hoop that closed them within 71-68, but Bender scored on a back-door- cut to halt the momentum, and the Judges were able to pull away from there for the 11-point win.

INSIDE THE BOX SCORE

• Five different Brandeis players scored in double figures. Zakheim led the way with 20 points, his fifth game out of seven with at least 20. He hit 8-of-13 from the field, 1-of-5 from deep and 3-of-5 from the line. Zakheim also dished out seven assists, one shy of a career-best, and grabbed six rebounds.
• Dhillon finished with a career-high 16 points off the bench, hitting 7-of-8 from the field, including both of his 3-pointers.
• Sophomore Ryan Weiss (Hewlett, N.Y./North Broward Prep) added 15 points and senior Elias Rodl (Berlin, Germany/Schulund Leistungssportzentrum Berlin) had 14.
• Bender added 12 points in reserve as he and Dhillon combined to outscore the Beacon reserves, 28-19.
• Rodl led all players with seven rebounds, as Brandeis won the battle of the boards, 30-20.
• The Judges outshot UMass Boston for the game, 58.3% (35-60) to 53.8% (28-52). They also had a season-high 24 assists on their 35 bucket, with Rodl and Weiss picking up five each in addition to Zakheim's seven.
• Brandeis's previous scoring high this season was 82 points, scored in overtime of their season opener at Babson.
• UMass Boston's Perkins was the game-high scorer with 29 points, while Laurent finished with 20. Davon Sanders added 10 off the bench – eight in the second half – as the three Beacons accounted for 59 of their 75 points.
• Laurent and Sanders led the visitors with five rebounds each, and Sanders had five assists.

UP NEXT

• The Judges will play an exhibition at Division I Yale University on Wednesday evening in New Haven, Conn., with a home contest on Saturday, December 6, against Emmanuel, their next official game.