AMHERST – The Souhegan Sabers kept things close, but ultimately couldn’t come up with a win, falling 58-52 to Oyster River on Friday night.

Things remained tight throughout much of the contest, with the both teams taking 27 points apiece into the halftime break, with Souhegan senior Khaled Nazeer’s basket tying things up just moments before the buzzer.

Oyster River’s greatest lead up to that point was six, and it managed a seven-point lead at one point in the third quarter before Souhegan clawed its way back again.

The hosts went into the final frame down, 41-39, but couldn’t close.

It took a pair of buckets from Oyster River’s Kyle Landrigan to give the visitors another healthy lead, and a measured, slower-tempo response from Souhegan proved unable to find a hole in the Bobcats’ defense, squandering time that drained away any chance of another

comeback.

“I’m a little frustrated, we had opportunities to win the game and we didn’t capitalize on them,” said Souhegan Head Coach Steven Pierce.

Landrigan lead all scorers with 20 points, also adding 13 rebounds in the win. Nazeer lead the Sabers with 13 points and 11 boards. Matt McCool had 10 points for the Sabers.

Souhegan (10-6) finishes the regular season at home against ConVal on Friday night.

Following Friday’s loss, Souhegan currently holds the seven seed in the Division II tourney chase and could end up anywhere seed as high as fifth or as low as 13th depending on what occurs next week.