President Barack Obama piled on Missouri GOP Senate candidate Todd Akin Wednesday night, mocking Akin by saying he "somehow missed science class."

"The interesting thing here is that this is an individual who sits on the House Committee on Science and Technology but somehow missed science class," Obama said at a fundraiser in New York City Wednesday night, the Associated Press reported. "But it's representative of a desire to go backwards instead of forwards. And fights that we thought were settled 20, 30 years ago."

Akin is being assailed from all sides for saying the female body "shuts down" the chances of conceiving from "legitimate rape." He has defied pleas from his own party leaders to drop out.

The Obama event was hosted by basketball star Michael Jordan, and the president Barack Obama used a sports analogy to describe the election campaign and his opponents, who he said played "dirty," Reuters reported.

"I can't resist a basketball analogy. We are in the fourth quarter, we're up by a few points, but the other side is coming strong and they play a little dirty," Obama said, saying his team was ahead but had some injuries.

"I'd say there's about seven minutes to go in the game. And Michael's competitiveness is legendary, and nobody knows better than Michael that if you've got a little bit of a lead and there's about seven minutes to go, that's when you put them away."