CASTLETON, Vt. – The Castleton University men's basketball team dropped a Little East Conference duel at Glenbrook Gym to Plymouth State Thursday night, falling by a final score of 74-50 on its home court.

Castleton shot 39.1 percent as a team (18-of-46) with a 25.0 percent rate (4-of-16) from three. Plymouth State converted on 48.4 percent (30-of-62) from the field and 27.8 percent (10-of-36) from three. The Panthers narrowly won the rebounding battle, 33-30. Castleton turned the ball over 20 times, leading to 27 Panther points, while PSU turned it over just 11 times, leading to six Spartan points.

Nate Plaisted led Castleton with 11 points, making 3-of-6 from the field and 4-of-4 at the line. Oluwadare Sowunmi added eight points on the night, as did Denis LeCours off the bench. Casey Belade chipped in seven points off the bench while Remy Brown hauled in a team-high seven rebounds.

Jaylen LeRoy had a game-high 17 points on 6-of-14 shooting, while Manny Alisandro notched a double-double with 16 points and 11 boards. Kevin Henry had 12 points and eight rebounds off the bench, while Cody Graham had 12 points and eight assists in 25 minutes of relief. Henry also added four steals and four assists.

Castleton got out to an early 5-0 lead, holding Plymouth State scoreless for nearly four minutes to open the game before the Panthers knocked down a free throw to get on the board. It was nearly another full minute before the Panthers hit a field goal as it took them nearly five minutes to make a shot from the field as Castleton led in the early-going. LeRoy hit a pair of threes to give Plymouth its first lead as the Panthers stymied Castleton's 5-0 run with a 9-0 run of its own to go ahead 9-5. A later 8-0 put the Panthers ahead 10, 21-11. The lead extended to a high of 16 points in the half when Graham had a steal and a fast-break layup to make it 29-13. Castleton ended the half on a 5-0 run to cut it to 29-18 at the break.

Castleton narrowed the gap to nine in the opening minutes of the half after a pair of free throws by Plaisted, but the Panther offense came to life and pulled away behind the strength of a 7-0 run later in the half to go ahead 54-33. The lead hit 20 points for the Panthers with 4:07 to play when LeRoy nailed another jumper to make it 61-41. The Panthers pushed the lead to a game-high 26 points with less than a minute to play, 74-48, but Diakite knocked down a late layup to give the game the final score, 74-50.

Castleton is back on the hardwood Saturday at 3 p.m. at home against Southern Maine.