WORCESTER, Mass.—Visiting Babson College cut a 17-point second-half deficit down to just two in the final minute before falling 78-72 in New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) men's basketball action on Saturday afternoon inside Harrington Auditorium. 

Babson, which had its six-game winning streak snapped, is now 12-6 overall and 6-3 in conference play. WPI improves to 15-3 overall and sits alone in first place in the NEWMAC at 8-1. 

First-year Thomas Ferdinando (Andover, Mass.) finished with 18 points, four rebounds and three assists to lead four players in double figures for the Beavers. Senior Timmy O'Toole (Milton, Mass.) produced 15 points on 7-of-9 shooting to go along with eight boards and three steals, while sophomores Ryan Frauenheim (Manasquan, N.J.) and Timmy Mulvey (Reading, Mass.) added 11 points apiece. 

Tim Reidy (Needham, Mass.) poured in a game-high 25 points on 9-of-13 shooting and Nathan Bledsoe (San Antonio, Texas) scored 17 points on 7-of-9 shooting lead four players in double figures for the Engineers. Jack Bleier (Victor, N.Y.) added 12 points, JR Newman (Havertown, Pa.) finished with 10 and Justin Molen (Newark, Del.) handed out a game-high eight assists to go along with nine points and six boards in the win. 

The Green and White trailed by as many seven twice over the first 11 minutes but got hoops from five different players during a 10-0 run to take a 26-23 lead with 5:59 to go in the first half. WPI responded by scoring on nine of its next 10 possessions, getting eight points from Reidy and five from Bleier while outscoring the visitors 20-7 over the final 5:36 of the frame to take a 43-33 edge into the locker room. 

The Engineers opened the second half with a 7-0 spurt to grab its largest lead of the afternoon at 50-33 on a triple by Reidy with 17:42 to play. The margin remained 15 after a layup by Reidy with 8:42 left before Babson responded with an 11-1 run that included four points apiece by O'Toole and sophomore Logan Murphy (Sandwich, Mass.) to pull within 66-61 at the 3:59 mark. 

Bledsoe knocked down a pull-up jumper along the right baseline extended the hosts' advantage back to 70-61 with 2:21 remaining, but Ferdinando canned consecutive three-pointers and Mulvey answered a layup by Reidy with another triple cut the Beavers' deficit to just 72-70 with 40 seconds to go. Ferdinando answered two free throws by Newman with a driving layup with 16.3 ticks left, but Reidy made it a two-possession difference by going 2-of-2 at the charity stripe and Babson turned the ball over on its ensuing possession ending the comeback bid. 

The Beavers shot 43.9 percent from the floor and turned 14 WPI turnovers into 23 points but struggled from beyond the arc going just 8-of-30 (26.7 percent). The Engineers shot 70.8 percent in the first half and 56.9 percent for the game, and went 10-of-19 from beyond the arc in the victory. 

Babson is off until next Saturday when it returns to Worcester to face Clark at 4 p.m., while WPI hosts the aforementioned Cougars on Wednesday at 7 p.m. 

GAME NOTES
•    The Beavers are 53-43 all-time against WPI but have dropped five straight regular season games inside Harrington Auditorium.
•    Six of the last nine games between the teams have been decided by six points or less, which includes both matchups this winter. 
•    With two three-pointers on Saturday, Ferdinando now has 58 this season breaking the Babson freshman record set by Michael Kingsley '97 in 1993-94 and matched by Mark Giovino '98 in 1994-95. 
•    The Beavers, who committed just 10 miscues on Saturday, have turned the ball over 10 times or fewer in five consecutive games.