Box Score PULASKI, Tenn. – In the final game of the regular season, the Belhaven men's basketball team clinched second place in the Southern States Athletic Conference West Division standings on the strength of a 67-64 win at Martin Methodist College Saturday afternoon. The Blazers, who are receiving votes in the latest NAIA Top 25 Coaches' Poll, earned the second seed in next week's conference tournament in Montgomery, Alabama.

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"This was an incredible team win and I'm really proud of our effort and resiliency to close the game out," Belhaven Head Coach John Aiken said. "Our players just refuse to lose and 14 conference wins is an incredible accomplishment. Our seniors have really taken this team on their shoulders."

The first half was tightly contested until the nine minute mark when Belhaven (16-13, 14-6 SSAC) found a rhythm on offense to close the half. Clinging to a 17-16 lead, the Blazers outscored Martin Methodist (17-10, 12-7 SSAC) during the final stretch 18-7, taking a 35-23 lead into the locker room. A triple by junior Dycus Juste kicked things off and then it was Juste again with a layup at the buzzer to end the half.

However, the Redhawks would not go quietly and put themselves back in the game midway through the second half. Trailing 45-34 with 15:25 to play, Martin Methodist went on a 14-3 run to knot the score at 48-48. John Taylor provided the equalizer on a layup with just over 10 minutes on the clock.

The Redhawks didn't stop there, as the scoring burst continued over the next three minutes. Two free throws by Darius Woods gave Martin Methodist their largest lead of the night at 57-50.

Suddenly, the Blazers had to go into comeback mode and that's exactly what they did. Over the next four minute span, Belhaven engineered a 13-3 run that pushed the team back in front 63-60. Junior Datodrick Pinkston, who returned to the court after missing two games with an injury, got things rolling on a layup followed by back to back field goals from junior Jordan Bedford to cap it off. Two free throws by senior Jonathan Ratliff with nine seconds left along with the defense sealed the win.

Four Blazers ended the day with double digit point totals, led by Jordan Bedford who poured in 14. Junior Jerrial Dawson produced 12 points off the bench on 5 of 7 shooting from the field. Ratliff and senior Chris Cofield each chipped in 11 points with Cofield dishing out a game high seven assists. Deon Bedford paced Belhaven on the glass with nine boards to go along with nine points.

As a team, the Blazers hit 46.6% of their field goals (27-58) and connected on 63.6% of their shots from the charity stripe (7-11). Both teams battled to a draw in the rebounding department with both sides hauling down 31.

Martin Methodist was guided by a game high 18 points from Darius Woods while Taylor and D'Angelo Tucker notched 15 and 12 respectively. Taylor earned a double double with 10 rebounds and Woods complemented his point total with four assists. As a team, the Redhawks made good on 40.7% of their field goals (22-54) and 73.7% of their attempts at the free throw line (14-19).

Belhaven will begin the postseason on Thursday at 2:00 PM against Southern Wesleyan University in the quarterfinals of the SSAC tournament. The Warriors are the third seed from the East Division.

"Southern Wesleyan is a very talented team that has won six of their last seven games so we'll have our work cut out for us," Aiken added. "We are excited to head to Montgomery and looking forward to the challenge."