Albany, NY — Russell Sage College's men's basketball team hosted Nazareth College on Friday night in an Empire 8 contest. After playing to a 73-73 deadlock at the end of regulation, the teams played to double overtime before the Golden Flyers collected an 87-84 win over RSC. With the win, Nazareth is now 6-2 overall and 6-1 in the Empire 8, while the Gators drop to 2-2 overall and in the league.

After regulation ended at 73-73 as Nazareth's sophomore guard Logan Blankenberg (Ontario, NY/Wayne Central) hit a three pointer at the buzzer to send the game to the first overtime after tying the action for the fifth time.

Sage led by as many as four points (77-73) to open the first extra session as juniors Tyler Mitchell (Bronx, NY/All Hallows) and Stuart Phair (Canberra, Australia) made back to back layups. With 16 seconds left, senior guard Stephen Gabel (Victor, NY/Fairport) hit a three pointer to tie the game at 79-79 and send the game into a second overtime period.

In the second overtime, Sage scored first as junior Amani Cummings (Brooklyn, NY/Transit Tech) made the first of a pair of free throws, only to have Nazareth answer back with layups from Jonathan Park and Gabel, before Blankenberg hit a three at 3:15 to put Nazareth ahead, 86-82. Cummings added a lay-up at 2:21 to pull Sage within two, but junior Zach Stenglein (Rochester, NY/Phillips Exeter) made the second of two free throws to seal the win as the Gators had back to back three's fall off the mark by Ryan Long in the final seconds.

For the game, Sage got 28 points from junior Jalon Borders (Bartow, FL/Bartow) as he shot 12-21 for the game. After Friday's action, Borders is now ninth at Sage in career scoring with 606 points.

Cummings dropped in 15 points, while Mitchell added 14 points and Phair finished with 12 points with eight rebounds. Phair added four blocks in the action as well and now has 60 career blocks and is now sixth all-time at Sage.

Nazareth was paced by the play of Gabel as he had a game-best 30 points and hit 12-of-21 field goals, while Stenglein added 20 points with nine rebounds. Junior Jonathan Park (Angola, NY/Lakeshore) added a double-double on 12 points with 11 rebounds.