AMHERST, Mass. -- Will Scherer scored 17 points Tuesday night while Bobby Sommers added 12 and Charlie Randall contributed a double-double to help the Amherst College men's basketball team win a gritty Littl3 3 contest against rival Wesleyan, 71-66, on Hixon Court in LeFrak Gymnasium. 

The Mammoths improved to 8-5 overall and head to Williams Friday night for their conference opener. Tip-off is 7 p.m.  The Cardinals fell to 8-4 on the season. 

GAME HIGHLIGHTS:

* The Mammoths only trailed once over the course of 40 minutes (10-9 with 13:16 left in the first half), but never led Wesleyan by more than 11 points. 

* It was a Sommers jumper with 12:59  to go in the opening stanza that gave the Mammoths the lead for good at 11-10. That ignited a 10-2 Amherst run which allowed the Mammoths to get up by seven. Scherer followed with a put back from the paint for a three-point lead. It was 15-12 when Marc Garraud came up with a bug steal and went coast-to-coast for the lay-up and 17-12 lead. Senior Mohammed Alausa capped the mini-run with a layup and a seven-point Amherst lead. 

* Another 10-2 run put the Mammoths up 34-23 before they settled for a 34-27 lead heading into the locker room at halftime.  Amherst shot 42.4 percent from the floor despite missing all seven three-point attempts in the half. Scherer led the way with 12 of his 17 points on 6 of 7 shooting. 

* Amherst was able to push its lead back to double digits in the first 92 seconds of the second stanza as first Randall found himself a lay-in from the paint, then Chris Hammond nailed a jumper and followed up wit a steal which led to a offensive rebound and put back from Alausa which gave the Mammoths a 40-29 lead with 18:28 remaining. 

* The Mammoths lead would fluctuate between six and 11 points for the next nine minutes. Wesleyan cut it to four on a pair of Jackson Cormier free throws with 9:14 remaining in the game, but the Mammoths answered with a 10-3 run of their own to push their lead back to 11 with 6:10 remaining. Hammond and Randall had four points each during that run. 

* Things got dicey at the end when the Cardinals Fritz Hauser drained a trey with 29 seconds that made it a 69-66 Amherst lead. After a five-second call against the Mammoths, Wesleyan had a chance to tie, but a steal from Sommers and his two subsequent field goals sealed Wesleyan's fate. 



BY THE NUMBERS:

* Amherst shot 44.8 percent (26 of 58) from the floor in the game despite finishing 0 for 12 from the three-point line. Wesleyan shot just 34.4 percent (22 of 64). 

* The Mammoths controlled the boards to the tune of a 50-35 margin, with Randall grabbing a team high 11 and finishing with a double-double (11 rebounds, 11 points). Scherer added 8 rebounds to his 17-point night.