BOSTON, Mass. - Seven Tom Messinger ('11, Florence, Mass.) trifectas led an Emerson College barrage of three-point shots as the Lions defeated Rivier College 69-60 in a Great Northeast Athletic Conference contest at Emerson's Brown & Plofker Gym.

Messinger was 7-14 from behind the arc to pace a Lion attack that featured a dozen made threes.  Emerson hit 12-27 long range shots as a team for a .444 percentage.

The Lions never trained in the game opening up a 17-3 lead less than seven minutes into the contest.  Rivier then ran off 10 unanswered points over the next two and a half minutes to shrink the Lion lead to 17-13.  Nathan Firn ('12, Waldesboro, N.C.) answered with a layup.  Two Messinger long balls around a Firn free throw nursed the lead back to 13 points.  Another three by Messinger at the 4:36 mark gave Emerson its largest lead of the half at 30-15.  After a Nick Bean ('11, East Longmeadow, Mass.) three brought the Raiders to within 10 points, Emerson ended the half on an Alex Dempsey ('12, Anchorage, Ak.) three to give the Lions a 36-23 halftime edge.

Rivier began the second half with a 12-2 run with D.J. Poitras ('11, Bow, N.H.) scoring five points and blocking two shots in the sequence.  The Raiders pulled to within 38-35 on a Will Snider ('12, Brooklyn, N.Y.) layup but Messinger answered with another three to keep Rivier at bay.

Emerson ran the lead back to 55-40 with 8:35 left, only to set the stage for another Raider rush.  Emerson maintained a double digit lead until a Snider layup made the score 58-49.  A steal and layup by Joe Granato ('12, Arlington, Mass.) cut the lead to seven, and although Emerson's Bryan Rouse ('10, East Greenwich, R.I.) moved the lead back to nine points, Granato wasn't done yet.

Granto nailed a three to make the score 60-54, then grabbed the rebound off a miss by Firn, and got an offensive rebound on the Raiders end.  Firn picked up his fifth foul on the play, and Granato nailed the two free throws to cut the lead to 60-56 with 1:20 remaining.  A layup by Emerson's Jeremy Shannon ('10, Lowell, Mass.) and two free throws by Snider kept the margin at four points with 42 ticks left.

The Lions then canned seven of eight free throws to seal the game.

Messinger led all scorers with 22 points.  Rouse and Dan Boylan ('12, Royal Oak, Mich.) each had a dozen.  Shannon had 10 assists in the win for Emerson.

Poitras led four Raiders in double figures with 16.  Bean had 14, Snider 11, and Granato 10 for the Raiders.

Emerson (5-5, 2-1 GNAC) will travel to pre-season GNAC favorite Albertus Magnus on Tuesday for a 7:30 tip.  Rivier (3-7, 0-3 GNAC) will host Mount Ida at 7:00pm that same evening in another GNAC match up.