BALTIMORE – Santi Aldama scored a career-high 22 points and had eight rebounds, three assists and two blocked shots on Sunday as five Loyola University Maryland men's basketball players scored in double-figures in an 84-80 Senior Day victory over Patriot League-leading Colgate University in Reitz Arena.
 
Prior to the game, the Greyhounds honored seniors Chuck Champion, Andrew Kostecka, KaVaughn Scott and manager Melanie Ornelas in a ceremony. Scott finished with 12 points, while Kostecka had matched that number and also had six assists without a turnover.
 
Isaiah Hart and Cam Spencer each had 13 points for Loyola and combined for seven assists.
 
Aldama and Hart scored the game's first four points in the opening minute, and Loyola (13-14 overall, 5-9 Patriot League) never trailed against a Colgate team that won last year's Patriot League crown and had a 1.5-game advantage in conference standings entering the game.
 
Up 6-2 after a Kostecka steal and fast-break layup less than two minutes into the game, Loyola scored 11 of the next 16 points to take a 10-point lead on a Scott layup following a screen-and-roll with Aldama.
 
Colgate (20-7, 11-3) got back within a point, 22-21, when Will Rayman scored two of his game-high 27 points on a layup at 9:41, but Loyola used an 18-2 run to go ahead by 17, 40-23, with 2:46 on the first-half clock.
 
Aldama and Spencer drained 3-pointers on back-to-back possessions during the stretch, and Scott punctuated it with a dunk off a Spencer assist.
 
Colgate's Tucker Richardson momentarily broke the run with a three, but Aldama answered with his third of the first half, giving him 13 at the break. The Raiders did, however, trim their deficit to 12 by halftime when Richardson scored in transition and Jordan Burns hit a long three before the stoppage.
 
Coming out of the locker room, Colgate scored the first seven points, getting within two possessions, 43-38, on a three by Rapolas Ivanauskas at 17:45, forcing a Loyola timeout.
 
Loyola got back on track after the respite with Aldama hitting a three in the corner and drawing a foul to make it a four-point play. He then knocked down another three on the Greyhounds' ensuing possession before he scored in transition at 14:43 to put the lead back to 14.
 
That was the margin with an even eight minutes left after two Kostecka free throws put the score at 66-52. Less than five minutes later, Kenneth Jones made two at the charity stripe with 3:10 to go in regulation, but Ivanauskas made a three at 3:01 to bring the margin back to single digits for the rest of the game.
 
Kostecka hit a pair of free throws with 49 ticks left, and Loyola led 81-75, but a Rayman 14 seconds later cut it to a 3-point Greyhounds' lead. Hart converted one of two at the free-throw line with 32 seconds on the clock, but Loyola held Colgate without a point on its next offensive possession.
 
The Greyhounds came up empty on two free throws with nine seconds left, and they gave up a Rayman layup with four seconds left as the Raiders called their final timeout.
 
On the inbound pass, Spencer threw a home-run pass over the defense to Kostecka who had a breakaway layup with two ticks left, cementing the win.
 
In addition to Rayman's 27, Ivanauskas had 14 points and 12 rebounds, while Burns and Richardson each scored 12.
 
Loyola continues its homestand on Wednesday, February 19, when it hosts the U.S. Military Academy at 7 p.m.