LEWISBURG -- Facing its largest deficit since Patriot League play began earlier this month and its best player in the locker room getting stitched up for an unspecified amount of time, the Bucknell men's basketball team faced some rare adversity Wednesday night at Sojka Pavilion.
The Bison held down the fort until center Mike Muscala returned, then they took over. Muscala scored six points late in the first half to ignite a big run that carried into the second half. Eventually the Bison took a 15-point lead in Wednesday's Patriot League showdown with American, finishing off a 67-61 win to take control of the league race.
Muscala finished with 21 points and 11 rebounds for his 11th double-double and third in a row. Bryan Cohen added 11 points, including the 1,000th of his career and Bryson Johnson broke out of a shooting slump with 13 points as the Bison moved two games ahead of every other team in the league heading into Saturday's first-half finale at Navy.
Bucknell has now won eight in a row overall and 16 consecutive league game dating back to last year, improving to 16-6 overall, 6-0 in the league. American falls to 13-8, 4-2 in the league.
In a dogfight in the early going, Muscala dove for a loose ball under the hoop five minutes into the game and his chin banged off the court. He stayed down on the floor as blood dripped from his chin and eventually he went back to the locker room for five stitches.
"This is the fourth time I've gotten stitches since I've been here, so I'm kind of used to it," said Muscala, who has four double-doubles in six league games so far. "It was weird coming back into the game and certainly something I don't want to do again."
With Muscala out of the game, American gained a little momentum. When Muscala left it was 5-5 but American took a 17-11 lead on three free throws from Blake Jolivette. Moments after Muscala returned, the Eagles led by seven after a three by Daniel Munoz and a pair of free throws, making it 21-14 with 5:55 left in the first half.
The seven-point deficit was Bucknell's largest deficit of the entire league schedule so far.
"(American) was really being aggressive on defense and we weren't either willing or able to get to our second or third option," said Bucknell coach Dave Paulsen. "Then we did, we started getting the ball to the basket and then we got inside touches. They weren't going to release from Cameron (Ayers) or Bryson."
Down seven, the Bison closed the first half with a flourish. With Muscala back on the floor, the Bison scored 14 of the final 18 points of the second half to take a 28-25 lead. Muscala scored six points in the run, Joe Willman added five more and Cohen capped the spurt with a bucket just before half. Bucknell then scored eight of the first 10 of the second and Johnson came off the bench to drain the first of three second half 3-pointers to make it a double-digit lead.
After combining for no points in the first 20 minutes, Cameron Ayers and Johnson thrived in the second half when American surrounded Muscala. Johnson scored all 13 of his points after intermission and Ayers added seven.
Bucknell's lead hit 15 midway through the second half and the Bison had seemingly iced it when Johnson knocked down a 3 from the top of the key late in the shot clock to make it 56-45 with a little more than five minutes to play.
"I thought Bryson Johnson was the difference," said American coach Jeff Jones. "We played zone for one possession, they figured it out and found him and Bryson knocked it down. We were trying to hang around and then he hit that one with three seconds left on the shot clock."
American scrapped until the final minute, getting within four thanks to some missed BU free throws, but the Bison were able to hang on for the victory.
"They really make you work for everything; you have to work for every stop on the defensive end and every basket on offense," said Paulsen. "At times we didn't always look as pretty as we have in other games, but we found a way to make some really gritty plays against a really good team."
