Box Score
Photo Gallery (images by Hailey Archambault & Sabrina Alger)

San Francisco, CA -- In a see-saw battle that wasn't decided until the final seconds, the Academy of Art University men's basketball team came up just short against rival Dominican University in their first matchup of the season. The Urban Knights saw some history made, as senior Ameer Shamsud-din became ART U's all-time leading scorer, but were still one possession short as the Penguins escaped by handing them an 87-84 defeat.

"Definitely the effort was there, it's just a matter of making plays down the stretch and getting stops," said head coach Julius Barnes. "Looking at the stat sheet we shot the ball extremely well, but weren't able to get the stops at the end. Overall I'm pleased with the effort, we've just got to get better at executing."

The Urban Knights jumped out to an early lead, scoring the first four points of the game. Dominican came back, taking an 18-16 lead with 10:49 to go in the first half. Coming into tonight's game, Shamsud-din was only two points off the career mark. And for the Knights' leading scorer, he took a long time showing it, going over twelve minutes without even attempting a field goal. But his 3-pointer with 7:48 on the clock in the first gave him 828 career points, the most in program history.

Unfortunately, Dominican then expanded that to their biggest lead of the game a few minutes later, when they went up 34-23 with just over five minutes to play. ART U played from behind the rest of the half, but two free-throws by Shamsud-din cut the Penguins' lead to 42-36 heading into the break.