PITTSBURGH — The men's basketball team held a slim two-point lead at the half in Saturday's opening round game against Carnegie Mellon in the Ramada Plaza Suites/Carnegie Mellon Invitational, but the Tartans opened things up in the second half to win 88-80.

The loss, which ends Hood's brief two-game winning streak, sends the Blazers (2-2) to Sunday's consolation final at 1 p.m. against Framingham State (Mass.) while Carnegie Mellon (2-1) advances to the final of their own tournament against Westminster College at 3 p.m.

Hood, which lost to Carnegie Mellon last year in the team's only other career match-up, held a 35-33 halftime lead before the Tartans outscored the Blazers in the second half, 55-45, for the win. There were five lead changes in the game and the score was tied seven times.

Santo Provenzano, who entered the contest averaging 28.0 points per game, led Hood with a game-high 29 points and David Wilson, who had a career-high 32 points in Hood's last game, continued his solid play with 18. Darnell Edmonds, seeing his first action of the season, dished out five assists and Sean Robine had 12 points.

Carnegie Mellon scored 26 of its points off of 25 Hood turnovers and the Blazers scored 21 points off of 16 Carnegie Mellon turnovers.

Five players scored in double figures for Carnegie Mellon. Chris Barlow-Wilcox had 21 points while A.J. Straub had 17 and Eliot Goren had 16. Nate Maurer and Jason Walters had 13 and 12 points, respectively, for Carnegie Mellon.

Barlow-Wilcox had 12 rebounds and Michael Divens had six assists and four steals.

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For more information contact Jason Brennan, sports information director, at 301.696.3978, or by e-mail at brennan@hood.edu.