First-year Aidan Phelan had 10 points off the bench, and Dan Anderson led the St. Lawrence University men's basketball team with a 20-point game, but the Saints fell 69-59 to host Nazareth at the opening game of the Mark's Pizzeria Crosstown Shootout on Friday night in Rochester, N.Y.

"In both of our losses this year, we have started slowly and allowed shooters to have clean looks. It has lead to career nights for our opponents," explained Saints head coach Chris Downs. "Our team needs to play defence with more urgency and intelligence right from the tipoff."

Nazareth kicked the game off by pouring it on offensively, busting out to an early 14-2 advantage, then making it 20-4 by the 12:41 mark of the opening half through accurate shooting and stingy defense, setting the table for an eventual wire-to-wire win.

Phelan hit a three shortly after, which closed the gap to 11, but that's as close as the Saints were able to get in the second half. Nazareth strung together 13 of the next 18 points, pulling ahead by as much as 21 points. Anderson and Chris Downs Jr. then scored by committee to narrow the score to 14 by halftime. 

St. Lawrence began to chip away at the Flyers' lead, and accelerated the comeback with a 12-0 run to cut the lead down to five. Six Downs points and successful trips to the charity stripe for Connor Parkes and Adam Dudzinski highlighted this run for the Scarlet and Brown. With 13:31 to go, it was a 43-38 game. 

An Anderson layup at 8:27 got the score down to 45-42 Nazareth, but the Flyers pulled away prior to the end of the game. Ultimately, they took an 11-point win. 

St. Lawrence returns to action at Nazareth University when they face St. John Fisher on Saturday in their second game of the Nazareth-hosted tournament.