Marist's biggest victory came inside, where the Red Foxes used superior size from Cielebak and 6'10 Tom Kenney to control the boards. Cielebak finished with a game-high 10 rebounds and Kenney added seven as Marist got 16 offensive rebounds, including an 11-5 first-half edge.

"Marist can play big at three positions," Sullivan said. "They can put guys above the rim where we can't, especially at small forward, where we're smaller. You try to negate that with better positioning, but we didn't."

Coleman, who continued to play a strong offensive role, scored 13 points on 4-of-7 shooting off the bench, and shocked the Lav Pav by draining a first-half three-pointer, but grabbed only two rebounds and fouled out in 22 minutes of time.

"We need rebounding out of the five and the three-spot," Sullivan said. "There are times when we won't get as many rebounds out of Dan because of the kind of offense we run for him, so it's critical for us to get rebounds out of the five."

Clemente was the Crimson's leading rebounder with six, while Gellert had five and junior Bryan Parker had four.

"Rebounding and defense lost the game," Clemente said. "If we don't do those things, we're not gonna win the game. That's the kind of team Marist is, they put a lot of athletes and slashers on the floor, their guards crash the boards, and we didn't get bodies on them."

With just over two minutes to play and Marist leading 77-66, guard Joe McCurdy, who finished with 12 points, missed a long three-pointer as the shot clock expired, but Donald Vale pulled down the rebound to extend the Red Foxes' possession.

Although Vale eventually missed two free throws, the sequence allowed Marist to run the clock down to 1:30, almost a minute of critical late-game time. The Red Foxes scored 19 points off offensive rebounds on the night.