GREENSBORO-After dominating the Fayetteville State Broncos in an exhibition game on Thursday, the North Carolina A&T men's basketball team competed in the annual Blue & Gold inter-squad scrimmage on Saturday evening in Corbett Sports Center. 

Lamont Middleton's 32 points on 14-for-14 shooting from the free throw line led the Blue to a 62-61 win over Gold.

"I thought it was very competitive," said A&T head coach Cy Alexander, who watched the tilt from the front row of seats as associate head coach Jay Joyner coached the Gold and assistant coach Darren Corbett coached the Blue.  

Aside from Middleton's 32, Alexander was also impressed by double-doubles from seniors DaMetriusUpchurch (10 points, 11 rebounds) of the Blue and Adrian Powell of the Gold (24 points, 13 rebounds). 

"My focus is really on Barber Scotia, to be honest with you," said Alexander about the Aggies exhibition game Sunday evening at 5 at Corbett Sports Center.  "We just wanted to start preparing tonight for them, correct the mistakes we made against Fayetteville State-transition defense, getting back a little better, and offensive execution, finishing plays.  We got a lot of open looks that we didn't finish. It's a work in progress.  We're going to take one game at a time.  Tomorrow we've got Barber Scotia." 

In the meantime, the Aggies got a chance to compete in a competitive game on Saturday. Gold led most of the way, but an Austin Witter 3-pointer brought the Blue to within two at 59-57. A trio of free throws by Middleton gave the Blue a 60-59 lead with 2:03 to play. But a hook shot by Powell put Gold up ahead by one with a minute left.  The Gold seemed to have the game in hand when Middleton turned the ball over.

But a steal by freshman Shaun Stewart gave Blue the ball back with 26 seconds left on the clock.  Powell fouled Middleton to bring him to the line with 10.9 seconds left.  Middleton nailed hit both free throws to give the Blue the victory after Jeremy Underwood's last-second shot went long.    

The men's basketball regular season begins on Friday, Nov. 9 against Greensboro College at 8 p.m.,in Corbett Sports Center.