(Hamilton, NY \u2013 Jan. 16, 213) The Bucknell Bison only lead by three points at the half but pulled out a 73-59 win over the Colgate men\u2019s basketball team Wednesday night.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re as good of a team as we\u2019ve played all season,\u201d head coach Matt Langel said. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t be surprised if by the end of Patriot League play they\u2019ve worked themselves into a Top-25 ranking just because they are so disciplined.\u201d<\/p>\n
Colgate (6-12, 0-2) was led by Murphy Burnatowski, who grabbed 17 points in the game. He has reached double digit scoring in all but one game this year for the Raiders. Sophomore Damon Sherman-Newsome was 5-of-7 from the floor, giving him 13 points to add to the Colgate scoring. Luke Roh yet again dominated on the boards for the Raiders pulling down nine rebounds.<\/p>\n
The Raiders edged the Bison on the boards, outrebounding them 35-33. However Bucknell had the slight advantage on the shooting percentage. They outshot the Raiders 45.5 percent to 42.6 percent overall. After going 3-of-6 from downtown in the first 20 minutes Colgate had a hard time finding the basket from long range, missing all six of their shot attempts in the second half.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe learned from the American game,\u201d Langel added. \u201cI was encouraged by some of the physicality we played with and the help-defense we played with. We made some good decisions on the offensive end that lead to some scoring opportunities.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously we made way to many mistakes throughout the game, especially in the early part of the season half. They don\u2019t force a lot of turnovers but when you turn that ball over against them they make you pay. Nine turnovers in the second half just digs you a hole and with a team like Bucknell they\u2019re not going to let you out.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bucknell (15-3, 2-0) saw top-scorer Mike Muscala grab 25 points, 10 rebounds and seven assists throughout the contest. Fellow teammate Joe Willman also reached a personal achievement in the game becoming the 37th player in Bison history to reach the 1,000-point mark. He ended the game with 10 points. Bryson Johnson (15-points) and Cameron Ayers (14-points) both hit double digits to add to the Bison scoring.<\/p>\n
The Raiders came out aggressively, making the Bison work for each and every basket. In a high-paced first 20 minutes there were six ties and four lead changes. Sherman-Newsome got on the board when he banked one in to tie the game at 14 all. A big block on the defensive end by Clayton Graham gave the Raiders a chance to take the lead. And they did just that when Sherman-Newsome hit one from downtown to make the score 17-16 with less than 10 minutes to play in the half.<\/p>\n
Bucknell would not go away however tying the game at 21 apiece when Ayers knocked one down from behind the arc. The Bison would re-take the lead at 35-29 with 1:02 left to play in the half after Johnson hit one of his three 3-pointers. Pat Moore would answer for the Raiders, knocking down one of his own to cut the Bison lead to only three heading into the locker room.<\/p>\n
Johnson would extend the Bison lead to nine midway through the second half on an 8-2 Bucknell run. But Burnatowski would grab three back by driving to the basket and getting fouled. He completed the three-point play to cut Bucknell\u2019s lead to only six.<\/p>\n
The Raiders had a hard time finding the basket, and allowed the Bison to grab a double digit lead for the first time in the game with less than eight minutes to play. Colgate would get the lead down to seven but could not overcome the deficit as they fell to the 2012 Patriot League runner up.<\/p>\n
Langel\u2019s squad will have only two days rest before they face the 2012 Patriot League Champions, Lehigh, in another conference matchup on Saturday at 7 p.m. They travel to the Lehigh Valley for their first road league game this season.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere very good and again they have a group of guys who have won a lot in their career,\u201d Langel spoke about their next opponent. \u201cThey\u2019ve played a few times without C.J. (McCollum) in the past and have won by a big margin.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey played a Top-25 VCU (Virginia Commonwealth University) team for 25 minutes toe-to-toe without C.J., so they\u2019re really good and we\u2019ll have our hands full going on the road. But again if we can continue to get better in a couple days I\u2019ll feel good about our chances.\u201d<\/p>\n
Bucknell 73, Colgate 59<\/p>\n
Colgate (6-12):\u00a0Murphy Burnatowski 17,\u00a0John\u00a0Brandenburg 8, Mitch Rolls 7, Pat Moore 5, Damon Sherman-Newsome 13, Brandon James 4, Luke Roh 5.\u00a0Totals:\u00a026-3-59.<\/p>\n
Bucknell (15-3):\u00a0Mike Muscala 25, Ryan Hill 1, Bryson Johnson 15, Joe Willman 10, Cameron Ayers 14, Steven Kasper 2, Brian Fitzptrick 6.\u00a0Totals:\u00a025-5-73.<\/p>\n
3-Point Field Goals:\u00a0Colgate 3 (Moore, Rolls, Sherman-Newsome); Bucknell 5 (Johnson-3, Ayers-2)<\/p>\n
Halftime:\u00a0Bucknell 35-32<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
(Hamilton, NY \u2013 Jan. 16, 213) The Bucknell Bison only lead by three points at the half but pulled out a 73-59 win over the Colgate men\u2019s basketball team Wednesday night. \u201cThey\u2019re as good of a team as we\u2019ve played all season,\u201d head coach Matt Langel said. \u201cI wouldn\u2019t be surprised if by the end […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[94],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-40985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=40985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/40985\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=40985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=40985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=40985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}