Waleed Farid had 19 points and six rebounds in the Ducks' 59-54 win over Arcadia on Friday.

ALLENTOWN, Pa. (November 17, 2006) – Junior guard Waleed Farid (Woodside, N.Y.) scored a game-high 19 points on six of 14 shooting from the floor as the Stevens Institute of Technology men’s basketball team opened the 2006-07 campaign with a 59-54 victory over Arcadia University on Friday afternoon as part of the Scotty Wood Tournament at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pa.  The win sends the Ducks (1-0) to the championship game of the tourney where they will face the winner of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Muhlenberg on Saturday at 8 p.m.

Friday’s victory was extra special in that it was also the first career win for head coach Josh Loeffler (West Grove, Pa.), who was making his collegiate coaching debut.  Loeffler spent each of the last three seasons as an assistant coach at three different institutions – Hamilton College, St. Lawrence University and Williams College.

“This win was certainly not easy,” Loeffler said.  “Our guys really played hard and battled the whole way.  That is all you can ask for as a coach.  We were able to fight through some stretches where things didn’t look very good for us, and that makes the victory even more worthwhile.”

Trailing 53-52 late in the game, Stevens outscored Arcadia 7-1 over the final 1:22 to pull out the win.  Senior guard Floyd Morris (East Windsor, N.J.) started the spurt with a steal and then found sophomore guard Virgil Gray II (Elmwood Park, N.J.), who converted a lay-up to put the Ducks ahead for good.  After a free throw by Gray gave Stevens a two-point lead, Morris came up with his fourth steal of the game.  Sophomore guard Anthony Passalacqua (Staten Island, N.Y.) calmly stepped to the line and knocked down two free throws with 30 seconds remaining to extend the margin to 57-53.  Passalacqua added two more free throws with 16 seconds left to provide the final points of the contest.

Gray had a solid game for the Ducks as he finished with 14 points on 5-for-5 shooting from the foul line.  Farid was 7-for-10 from the charity stripe.  He collected six rebounds and two steals to go along with his 19 points.  Passalacqua was five of 11 from the field and 4-for-4 at the line for 16 points.  He also had five rebounds and four steals in his debut with the Ducks.

Senior forward/center Dave Boettcher (Media, Pa.) recorded 14 points and six rebounds for Arcadia (0-1), which won 16 games and reached the semifinals of the Pennsylvania Athletic Conference tournament last year.  Boettcher made seven of 14 field-goal attempts for the Knights.  Sophomore guard Bobby Mulholland (Wildwood, N.J.) had 14 points and seven rebounds in the game.

Arcadia got off to a fast start as the Knights led by as many as seven points on two occasions (16-9 and 18-11) during the first half.  Trailing by five points with less than two minutes to go in the opening period, Stevens worked its way back into the contest as Passalacqua nailed a jumper.  Farid’s basket with six seconds left in the half brought the Ducks to within 25-24 at the break.

Tied at 33-all with just over 15 minutes remaining in regulation, Stevens went on an 8-0 run to grab its biggest lead of the game.  Passalacqua got things started with a three-pointer.  Farid added a three-point play and a lay-up to push the margin to 41-33.

Soon after, Arcadia responded with an 11-1 run to turn a 43-36 deficit into a 47-44 lead with six-plus minutes left to play.  Mulholland came up big for the Knights in that stretch as he scored four points to fuel the spurt.

Despite being out-rebounded (36 to 30) and out-shot (40.7 percent to 35.8 percent), Stevens willed its way to victory.  The difference in the game came at the foul line where the Ducks made 17 of 21 attempts as opposed to just six of 11 by the Knights.  Stevens also forced Arcadia into 19 turnovers – largely because of the strong defensive effort put forth by freshman guard Matt Higgins (Freehold, N.J.) and Morris.

NOTE - Muhlenberg College will be providing Live Stats of Saturday's championship game.  Fans can follow all the action at http://www.muhlenberg.edu/sports/mbblive/xlive.htm