SARATOGA SPRINGS, N.Y. – The Ithaca College men's basketball team saw its season come to an end on Saturday in the Liberty League Semifinals, as the Bombers fell to top-seeded and host Skidmore College, 82-77, inside Williamson Sports Center. Ithaca will conclude its season with a 16-11 record, which are the most wins for the program since 2012-13. Skidmore improves to 18-7 overall and will face off against Hobart College tomorrow for the Liberty League's automatic bid to the NCAA Championship.

Junior Sebastian Alderete paced Ithaca's offense with a career-high 29 points on 10-of-20 shooting from the floor, including 6-of-9 from 3-point range. Alderete also made three attempts at the free throw line and pulled down seven rebounds, to go along with three steals.

Senior Peter Ezema entered tonight's game just one rebound shy from tying the program's all-time rebounds record and surpassed that mark with seven boards in the contest. Ezema finishes his career with 927 rebounds, which breaks the 50-year old record of 921 set by Greg Albano (1966-69). Ezema would also score five points in the game.

Junior Riley Thompson added 11 points, while freshman Skylar Sinon chipped in 10 points and senior Matt Flood contributed nine points.

Freshman Zach Warech finished the night with five points and four assists.

Ithaca shot 29-for-69 (42%) overall and 12-for-31 (38.7%) from 3-point range, but the Bombers allowed 20 offensive rebounds by Skidmore, which led to 16 second chance points. Skidmore also went to the line 28 times, compared to 11 for IC, and made 20 of those attempts.

Defensively, the Bombers struggled to find an answer for the scoring duo of Edvinas Rupkus and Noah Meren. Rupkus led all scorers with 31 points on 11-of-23 shooting, while Meren had 28 points, 10 rebounds and made 10 free throw attempts.

Over the opening 9:12 of play, the score was tied five times, but Ithaca never led until a 3-pointer from Bryan Karl gave IC an 18-15 advantage with 10:10 remaining in the half. The Thoroughbreds quickly tied things up with a three-ball of their own, which sparked a 14-1 run over the next 4:17, to push their lead out to 29-19.

Ithaca answered with back-to-back triples from Flood to cut its deficit to 29-25 with 5:03 left. The difference would stay between three and five points for the rest of the half until Alderete connected from distance with nine seconds left to make the score 41-39 heading into intermission.

Out of the break, Ithaca came out on fire as the Bombers jumped out with an 11-0 run within the opening 2:50 to turn a two-point deficit into a nine-point lead. During that stretch, Warech scored all five of his points, while Alderete and Thompson hit 3-pointers.

Skidmore ended its scoreless drought at the 16:07 mark and pulled back to within two points at 51-49 just over a minute later.

After an Alderete three pushed IC's lead back out to five, 54-49, Skidmore crept back to within a point at 55-54 with 12:28 left. A 5-0 spurt from the Bombers made it a two possession game at 60-54, but Skidmore battled back to regain the lead at 63-62 with 8:28 to play.

With 7:45 to play, Alderete put IC back ahead with two makes at the line, but it was short lived, as Rupkus hit a pair for Skidmore on the next trip down to floor to flip the lead back to the Thoroughbreds 32 seconds later.

Flood knotted the game back up at 67-67 with 6:24 left, which would be the final time the contest was tied, as a 3-pointer from Skidmore 1:14 later gave the Thoroughbreds the lead for good.

Over the final 5:10 of play, the difference remained within one possession until 80-75 with 11 ticks left. A bucket from Thompson were the final points of the season for IC and the game was capped off with two made free throws by Skidmore with four seconds to go.