Santos comes up big as UMass tops George Mason 69-67

AMHERST, Mass. (AP) — Freshman Preston Santos scored a career-high 17 points and had a game-saving block as UMass held on to defeat George Mason 69-67 on Sunday.

After his block with 13 seconds to go, Santos snared the rebound and was fouled. He missed the front end of the one-and-one but the Patriots couldn’t connect on two late 3-point attempts.

Down 14 with 5:21 left, George Mason tied the game at 66 on Jordan Miller’s move under the basket with 1:23 to go.

UMass made 3 of 4 free throws and George Mason 1 of 2 to set up the frantic last half minute.

Tre Mitchell had 16 points and three assists for UMass (10-14, 4-7 Atlantic 10 Conference), Sean East II added 12 and Djery Baptiste 10.

Javon Greene had 19 points for the Patriots (13-10, 2-8), who have now lost four consecutive games. Miller added 12 points and Jamal Hartwell II 10.

The Minutemen leveled the season series against the Patriots with the win. George Mason defeated UMass 73-63 on Jan. 22. UMass faces Dayton at home on Saturday. George Mason plays VCU on the road on Wednesday.

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Elements of this story were generated by Automated Insights, http://www.automatedinsights.com/ap, using data from STATS LLC, https://www.stats.com