WALTHAM, Mass. – A berth in Saturday's Northeast-10 Conference Men's Basketball Championship game will be on the line when the Bentley University Falcons and the Saint Anselm College Hawks square off Wednesday at 7 pm in a semifinal contest at Saint Anselm's Stoutenburgh Gym in Manchester, N.H. A free webcast will be available at http://www.saintanselmhawks.tv/.

The Falcons taking on the Hawks in the conference tournament is far from an unusual occurrence. In fact, it'll be the 18th time since 1985 the two have met with Bentley owning a 9-8 advantage. Saint Anselm has prevailed in four of the last five, including 79-78 in the 2014 quarterfinals. Three of the previous 17 have come in the semis with the Falcons winning in 1989 and 1991 and the Hawks getting the win in 2006.

Bentley, seeking to reach the title game for the first time since 2016, advanced with a 68-65 road win over The College of Saint Rose Sunday afternoon. That was a season-best fourth straight win for coach Jay Lawson's club with the third seed out of the NE10's Northeast Division improving to 16-11 on the season.

Saint Anselm, the Northeast Division champion, posted a 93-86 quarterfinal win over Southern Connecticut State, the Hawks' 11th straight home court victory. Coach Keith Dickson's team, 21-7 overall, has won seven of its last ten with the three losses, oddly enough, coming against the three Northeast Division teams who didn't qualify for the postseason (Franklin Pierce, Assumption, St. Michael's).

It'll be the third meeting of the season between the two clubs with Bentley looking to avenge two earlier losses, 88-86 in Waltham on Dec. 9 and 86-66 at Stoutenburgh two-and-a-half weeks ago.

In the first meeting, the Falcons overcame a 12-point deficit in the final 6:40 before two free throws by Hawk junior Tim Guers with 3.9 seconds left broke an 86-all deadlock. In the rematch, Saint Anselm buried 11 three-pointers and limited Bentley to just four in a wire-to-wire victory.

First-team All-Conference junior guard Ryan Richmond (Toronto, Ont./Thomson Collegiate) led Bentley in the two games, averaging 25.5 points on 48 percent shooting. For Saint Anselm, the triumvirate of Guers, Cody Ball and Taylor Fortin made 21 of 46 three-pointers and combined for 132 of the Hawks' 174 points.,

Bentley closed out its quarterfinal game with a 10-2 spurt over the final ten minutes, denying the Golden Knights on eight of their final nine possessions. Richmond led the way with 21 points, junior forward Zach Gilpin (Hampden, Maine/Hampden Academy) added 19 (his most since late December) and senior forward Brandon Wheeler (Stamford, Conn./Trinity Catholic HS) had the go-ahead basket with 2:14 to play.

Richmond will enter the game with a 23.2 average, a mark that exceeds Ray Andersen's single season school record by four-tenths of a point. In his last two games, he's been on target on 23 of 36 shots, including seven of ten from deep.

Sophomore forward Chris Hudson (Hodgdon, Maine/Northampton Williston School) and Gilpin are Bentley's other double-figure scorers, averaging 13.2 and 12.1 points respectively. Hudson has made seven of eight threes during the streak and is second on the team in rebounds at 6.3.

Wheeler has put together a solid three-game stretch in which he's averaged 11 points on 13-of-19 shooting. He's eighth in the conference in both rebounds and steals.

Guers, named earlier in the week as the NE10 Player of the Week, averages 21.8 points, 7.5 rebounds and 5.3 assists for the Hswks. Ball, also a junior, is third in the conference in three-pointers (86) and is averaging 15.2 points. Fortin (14.0) and freshman Chris Paul (11.6) are the team's other double-figure scorers.

In their quarterfinal win, all four scored in doubles with Paul leading the way with 25 points on 9-of-12 shooting. The Hawks struggled at the line (8-23) but had a huge advantage at the line, finishing 27 of 39.

Saint Anselm and Bentley rank second and third in the conference in scoring, putting up 83.8 and 79.8, respectively. Defensively, they are similar, both giving up about 73.5 points a game.

In the other semifinal, Southwest champion Le Moyne will host Merrimack out in Syracuse. Those two met once during the regular season with the Dolphins prevailing 68-61.