SWARTHMORE, Pa. – Gettysburg rallied late, but came up on the short end of a 69-61 decision at 12th-ranked Swarthmore in Centennial Conference (CC) men's basketball action Saturday afternoon.
 
Playing their first nationally-ranked opponent of the season, the Bullets (3-9, 1-4 CC) cut a 14-point deficit in half with 4:07 left. But the comeback ran out of time versus the Garnet (10-1, 5-0 CC), who iced the game by making their last four free throws in the final minute.
 
Senior forward Cameron Stewart (Sydney, Australia/Newington College) scored a season-high 18 points for Gettysburg while sophomore guard Nick Antolini (Babylon, N.Y./Babylon) notched 17 points and a career-high-tying eight rebounds. Sophomore guard Danny Duffey (Huntingdon Valley, Pa./Lower Moreland) added eight points, six assists, and five rebounds.
 
Junior center Luke Cooper (Medford, N.J./Shawnee) also netted eight points for the Bullets while senior forward Matt England (Warrington, Pa./Holy Ghost), playing for the first time in five games due to injury, posted seven points and six rebounds in 19 minutes off the bench.
 
Zack Yonda scored 21 points and shot 12-for-12 at the foul line to lead Swarthmore while Zac O'Dell added 12 points.
 
The Garnet led 53-39 – their biggest lead of the game – after a conventional 3-point play from Yonda with 8:22 left. But the Bullets used a 7-0 run minutes later to make it a 57-50 contest. Duffey opened the spurt with a lay-up before sophomore guard Nick Lord (Millersville, Pa./Penn Manor) drained a 3-pointer. Cooper then dropped in a lay-up off a Duffey in-bound pass with 4:07 showing.
 
An Antolini runner made it 61-54 with 2:24 left before Swarthmore scored the next four points to push its lead back to 11 with 1:00 remaining. But the Bullets refused to go away, as Antolini buried a 3-pointer before Abass Sallah missed the front end of a 1-and-1 for Swarthmore.
 
Antolini banked in shot to make it a 65-59 game with 19 ticks showing, but that's when the Garnet secured the win at the foul line, as Cam Wiley and Yonda each went 2-for-2 at the stripe down the stretch.
 
Gettysburg applied the defensive clamps early in the game, holding Swarthmore to just four points over the opening eight minutes while outscoring the hosts 9-4 to start the game. The offense would soon pick up for both sides, however, and a 12-2 run put the Garnet up 25-15 with 2:45 left in the half. But the Bullets ended the period on a 7-2 spurt to make it 27-22 at the intermission.
 
Another 7-2 run, capped by a 3-ball from Stewart, pulled the Bullets within 35-33 with 16:43 remaining. After Swarthmore pushed the lead back to nine, Gettysburg went on a 6-0 run to cut the deficit to three. England scored four points over the stretch as the Bullets trailed 42-39 with 12:41 to go. However, that's when Swarthmore used an 11-0 run over a four-minute stretch to seize its 14-point lead.
 
Gettysburg returns to Centennial Conference play on Tuesday, when it hosts Haverford at 6 p.m. in the first game of a men's-women's doubleheader in Bream Gym.