Beckford sparks F&M to 7th victory

Opponents of Franklin & Marshall are well aware of what they are getting into.

They know all about the exploits of James McNally, Mike Baker and Georgio Milligan, who have seemingly been hooping it up at Mayser Center forever.

Now, a new offensive weapon in the arsenal is emerging that makes the Diplomats even more dangerous.

For the seventh time in eight games, and sixth straight overall, Brandon Beckford scored in double-digits Saturday to help fuel F&M to a 78-65 win over Haverford in a Centennial Conference men's basketball game at Mayser.

Beckford, a 6-foot-4 sophomore, scored 13 of his 15 points in the first half on 5-of-6 shooting from the floor, including a pair of 3-pointers.

"If the opportunity is there, I'll take it as long as it's a good shot," Beckford said. "I just try to do whatever the team needs me to do, on offense or defense."

McNally led all scorers with 20 points, Milligan had 15 and Baker added 14 and pulled down a game-high 14 rebounds.

"Ideally, we want five offensive weapons on the court at all times," F&M coach Glenn Robinson said. "You always want five options out there, so they can't just lay off any one man and help on your big scorers."

Steve Tolliver, Robinson's fifth starter, had seven points.

Beckford, who averaged 4.5 points per game in 30 appearances (nine starts) last season, is the team's third-leading scorer this year with 13.1 per game. He is also F&M's top 3-point threat, hitting 12 of 30 attempts.

"You could easily call him our most-improved player, and he's only going to keep getting better," Robinson said. "He's just improved his confidence, his shooting is way up and he's one of our best defenders."

Down 5-4 early on, a Baker baseline jumper and a Beckford trey got the offense rolling, and the Diplomats (4-0 CC, 7-1 overall) eventually led by 15 (39-24) in the first half. They settled for a 43-30 halftime lead, thanks in large part to a 19-for-32 shooting performance.

"We were really sporadic," Robinson said. "We played really well in spurts and not so well in others. When we played well, they really couldn't keep us from scoring. They were definitely good enough and playing hard enough that if we didn't do everything right, then we couldn't score."

McNally's three-point play with 13:19 left in the second half gave the Diplomats their biggest lead, 63-42. But an 11-2 run by the Fords (3-2, 5-5) made it a 65-53 game with 9:14 to play. F&M, though, answered with an 8-0 run that pushed the lead back to 20 with 5:38 left.

Haverford, which had won its previous three games, was led by Cam Baker's 19 points. Sam Permutt has 18 and Brett Cohen came off the bench to add 11.

But they were no match to F&M's big five.

"When all five can score and they move the ball around the offense the way it's supposed to be run, we're going to get open shots," Robinson said. "If they're ready to shoot them, they're going to make a lot of them."