In a year where so much so much is flipped upside down, coach Jerrod Calhoun and his staff wanted to find a way to honor their seniors, and other upperclassmen graduating.

Youngstown State had the ability to schedule one more non-conference matchup, and Monday afternoon they welcomed in Rochester College (NAIA), as well as a limited contingent of fans into the Beeghly Center.

YSU was also happy to escape with a 60-50 win, after the Warriors kept it within single digits for a majority of the contest.

Earlier in the season, Calhoun expressed interest in trying to find a Division I opponent, but his team just wanted to find a fifth non-conference contest.

Correspondent photo / Robert Hayes YSU’s Michael Akuchie, who scored a team-high 16 points in a 60-50 win over Rochester College on Monday, passes out during the second half.

“We asked the guys, do you want to try and get another game and hopefully end up playing 25 games.” he said “You’re allowed five non-conference games, this is the only team we could find, and we knew they were really good, but we just couldn’t find anybody else.”

Prior to the contest, Jamir Thomas (senior), Christian Bentley (senior), Michael Akuchie (senior), Garrett Covington (senior), Naz Bohannon (senior), Darius Quisenberry (junior), Geoff Hamperian (junior), and student-manager Nicholas Gainor were honored before opening tip-off.

Due to it not being a Horizon League contest, a limited number of tickets were available for fans, similar to contests earlier in the season against Point Park, WVU Tech, and Carlow.

“Just a wild crazy year, you don’t get to do a normal senior night for your guys, so we just said graduates.” Calhoun explained “Because as of right now, you don’t really have any clue who’s coming, going, who’s going to graduate and not come back, who would come back.”

“Obviously all those things will be worked out here in the next couple of weeks, but we wanted to do something to acknowledge all of our players that graduated, it really wasn’t about just the seniors, but a special senior class because these guys have been through a lot.”

Bohannon (1,000 points, 900 rebounds), Covington (1,000 points), Quisenberry (1,000 points) and Akuchie (Horizon League single game record 24 rebounds vs RMU on Feb. 6) were also given special game balls for their accomplishments with their families in attendance.

Rochester did make an attempt to spoil the festivities with YSU holding a slim 27-21 lead at halftime and only 33.3 percent from the field. Virgil Walker, who had a game-high 17 for the Warriors, tied the game at 27 with a layup off a turnover early in the second half.

Leading 35-32, freshman Alex Vargo netted a three to kickoff a 12-0 YSU run that was capped off by an Akuchie fastbreak layup to push the lead to 47-32 before a media timeout. Rochester got to within eight, but the Penguins thanks to late game scoring out of Vargo and Akuchie.

Overall, the Penguins only shot 37.1 percent for the game on 23-62 shooting “Can’t thank the fans enough for coming, just wish we would have made some more shots for them.” Calhoun said “I wish the ball would have went in the basket a little bit more, I wish we would have played better, but our guys are battling.”

Akuchie led YSU (11-10, 6-10) with 16 points, and seven rebounds, with Quisenberry scoring 12 in his first home contest since January 2. Greyson Kelly saw limited action after being sore following a pair of overtime games against Robert Morris, in which he saw his first action since coming off ankle surgery.

The Penguins currently rank 5th in the league standings and will host Purdue Fort Wayne (6-11, 5-11) this weekend as the eye a top four spot and a first round bye. Opening tip-off for game one is set for Friday at 5pm in the Beeghly Center.