WINCHESTER, Va.  – The Shenandoah University men's basketball team wrapped up its non-conference schedule Monday evening with a 72-71 loss to former USA South Conference rival Ferrum.

Shenandoah (1-10) had a chance to win it at the buzzer, but saw senior Jared Carithers' 3-pointer bounce left off the rim as time expired.

Carithers' miss made DJ Christian the hero for Ferrum (5-8).

Christian scored the winning points for the Panthers on a driving layup and bonus free throw with 1:15 remaining.

Each team missed a 3-pointer in the intervening 74 seconds before Carithers took the final shot of the contest just prior to the buzzer sounded.

Shenandoah started the final sequence by taking a timeout with six seconds remaining and then inbounding the ball to Carithers in the backcourt out of the timeout.

Carithers drove to the middle of the floor and got off a clean shot, but it hit the left side of the rim and into Malcolm Clark's hands as the clock read 0:00.

Christian's bucket and free throw capped a contest in which the two teams traded the lead four times and were tied on 10 additional occasions.

All four lead changes and nine of the 10 ties came in the second half.

Both teams held significant leads – FC by eight points with 6:57 to play in the first and SU by six at the 15:29 mark of the second.

Trailing 37-35 at the break, Shenandoah scored 11 of the initial first 14 points of the second half to take that six-point advantage.

Ferrum answered with a 6-0 run and eventually took another eight point lead, 61-55, with 11:05 left before the Hornets roared back to tie it at 65-65 with 6:11 left.

From this point on, the two teams were not separated by more than one point.

Clark led all scorers with 19 points while Carithers added 12.

Alek Ayer had 16 for the Panthers.

Shenandoah returns to ODAC play on Wednesday with a 7 p.m. home game against Eastern Mennonite.

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