POMONA, NJ – Rutgers-Newark junior forward Phil Barnes had 11 points and 14 rebounds, but top-seeded Richard Stockton held off the Scarlet Raiders, 62-54, in the New Jersey Athletic Conference Championship game in the RSC Sports Center. 

NCAA Box Score & Play-by-Play

2009 NJAC Championship Tournament Bracket

Junior forward Deshawn Singleton netted a team-high 14 points for the Raiders, but sophomore guard Kai Massaquoi poured in a game-high 21 points to lead the Ospreys (25-2) to the their second straight NJAC title. Along with the win comes the conference's automatic bid to the NCAA Championship Tournament. Junior forward Omar Smith added 15 points and eight rebounds for Stockton. 

Rutgers-Newark (16-12) now must wait for a probable bid to its fifth straight ECAC Metro Championship tournament. That 8-team affair is set to begin on Wednesday. 

A layup by Massaquoi gave the Ospreys a 49-44 lead with 6:38 left, setting up a frantic finish. After a pair of Singleton free throws and a Massaquoi charity toss made it 54-50 with 3:18 left, Massaquoi ignited the game's crucial sequence with a steal. 

Senior forward David Cherry was whistled with an intentional foul as he chased Massaquoi on a breakaway with 47 seconds left. An ensuing technical foul whistled on the Raider bench gave the Ospreys four free throws and the ball. RSC made three of four from the line to up the lead to 57-50. 

Layups by junior guard Tim Smith and Cherry wrapped around another free throw by junior guard Santini Lancioni trimmed the Stockton lead to 58-54 with 18 ticks left. But, Lincioni and Smith each dropped in a pair of free throws in the final 16 seconds to put the game away.

Freshman guard Greg Moore, who scored all 10 of his points in the opening 20 minutes, helped the Raiders earn a 31-31 stalemate at the intermission by scoring six points on consecutive trips down the floor to rally the Raiders from a 25-20 deficit in the final 4:15 of the period. After Massaquoi dropped in a pair of free throws to boost the Ospreys to their biggest lead of the period, Moore followed with his second 3-point jumper of the half at 4:15 to whittle the led to two. After RSC's Michael Farrow countered with a layup, Moore connected on his third trey with 2:58 left to deadlock things at 27-27. A Barnes jumper with 1:08 left and a layup with just three seconds remaining off set a pair of RSC field goals to send the teams to the locker rooms deadlocked. Massaquoi had 14 points at the half as Rutgers-Newark stymied NJAC Player of the Year Lancioni – limiting him to just three points and three field goal attempts in the half.