Jones To Close Collegiate Career

NEW PALTZ — SUNY New Paltz men’s basketball standout Robert Jones has just two games remaining in his stellar four-year Hawk career.

Jones, a Jamaica, NY native, became the 12th men’s player in school history to score 1,000 career points in the Hawks’ final game last season at Plattsburgh.

To date, he has amassed exactly 1,300 points to rank sixth on New Paltz’s all-time scoring list. Former Wallkill High standout Eric Bell (1992-96) is fifth on the list with 1,359 points, while Curtis “Smooth” Hammond (1978-82) is the Hawks’ all-time scoring leader with 2,165 points.

Jones would need to more than double his 13.5 scoring average to pass Bell on the list. Last Friday, though, Jones had a career-high 33 points to help lead New Paltz (6-16 overall, 5-13 SUNYAC) to an 81-70 home win over Geneseo. His previous career high was 29 points, in a win over Centenary (NJ) on Jan. 19, 2000.

Jones has a much better chance of catching Bell in the career rebounding column.

Entering this weekend, Jones has 855 rebounds, just 17 less than Bell’s 872, which ranks third and second, respectively, on New Paltz’s all-time list. He needs to get only one more rebound than he is currently averaging (8.3 rpg) in his final two games to surpass Bell, and trail only Ed Shuster’s (1965-68) 902 rebounds on the list.

In his free time, Jones, a senior Business Management major, serves as New Paltz’s Student Association Vice President for Finance. He is a 1997 Brooklyn Tech graduate.

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Note to editors: Photos of Robert Jones can be downloaded from the SUNY New Paltz web site at http://hawk.newpaltz.edu/news/images/jones.html.