By Nico Bermudez -- STAFF WRITER At the conclusion of an exhilarating back-and-forth affair, the Pride came away with its second straight Battle of Long Island win Tuesday night over Stony Brook. Hofstra took this one 84-81 and improved to 7-3 while riding a four-game winning streak.
“Our battle cry coming into this one was that the toughest team on the floor is going to win the game, and I don’t think we came out tough enough – they came out tougher, but we ended up tougher,” said Hofstra head coach Joe Mihalich.
The Pride fell to an early 14-5 deficit, but came right back into the game via a 15-4 run. Wright-Foreman led the way in this run with seven of the Pride’s 15 points over that span.
Justin Wright-Foreman once again finished with the highest point total, logging 33 in the contest. This was his second straight game scoring 30 or more points. Wright-Foreman was ultimately the one who iced the game for the Pride as he drained three free throws within the final two minutes to give his team the lead which they would hold on to.
The other star of the game was Desure Buie.
When coach Mihalich had the opportunity to speak about Buie he made it clear that before he talked about his performance, he wanted to mention how great his character is; he even stated that Buie was the player of the game in the Battle of Long Island.
“There is no better person [Desure Buie] in the world than this guy. High character person. Puts the team first and is always ready willing and able.” Mihalich said.
Buie played for 32 minutes against Stony Brook, amounting for his career-high in minutes played, helping him cash in for his career-best 19 points.
Down 58-54 with under 11 minutes to play, the Pride went on for an 11-0 run to take a 65-58 lead. To give an idea of how much this game swung back and forth, Stony Brook was able to tie the game at 77 with about two minutes remaining.
Wright-Foreman then closed it out with five made foul shots and one jumper to put it out of reach for the Seawolves.
Hunter Sabety and Kenny Wormley added nine points each. Sabety also crashed seven boards in 14 minutes.
Hofstra is off until Dec. 20 when they face off against Manhattan. Hofstra is marked down as the home team, but this game will take place at Adelphi University.