Bucknell University
1-0
Rider
0-1
Bettencourt's Last-Second Shot Lifts Bucknell Men's Basketball Past Rider, 56-54
11/18/2005 7:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Nov. 18, 2005
LAWRENCEVILLE, N.J. - Kevin Bettencourt canned an off-balance, 17-foot jumper with 1.2 seconds left to give Bucknell a hard-fought 56-54 victory over Rider in its 2005-06 opener at sold-out Alumni Gym on Friday night. Chris McNaughton scored 14 points to lead the Bison, who won at Rider for the first time since 1988-89.
Jason Thompson had 17 points and Edwin Muniz tallied 11 points and 11 rebounds for the Broncs.
The game was a defensive struggle right to the very end, and neither team led by more than seven points all night. Rider led by that margin at 39-32 after Harris Mansell's 3-pointer with 14:57 remaining in the contest.
The Bison, who struggled from the outside for most of the night, finally hit a hot streak when John Griffin, Bettencourt and Charles Lee all hit threes in a 2:14 span to spark a 9-2 run and knot the game at 41.
The Bison trailed 52-48 with just over two minutes to play when Thompson rebounded a Bettencourt miss, but Lee stripped Thompson under the basket and fed Donald Brown for a big layup. Then the Bucknell defense took over.
The Bison forced a shot clock violation with 1:13 to play, then after another Bettencourt miss - his seventh in a row - they forced Muniz to take an off-balance shot at the end of the shot clock with 28 seconds left. Abe Badmus rebounded, the Bison called timeout, then Lee found Griffin open on the left wing for a clutch go-ahead 3-pointer. The shot with 17.5 seconds left gave Bucknell its first lead of the half.
But Rider answered quickly, going to Thompson on the low block, and the Rider center was fouled by McNaughton. Thompson rattled in both free throws to give Rider the lead back at 54-53 with 7.6 seconds left.
After a timeout, Badmus handed off to Bettencourt, who shook out of his shooting slump by draining a jumper with a toe on the 3-point line.
Rider threw a long inbounds pass out of bounds, and Bettencourt hit 1 of 2 free throws with 0.6 seconds left to seal the win.
Lee added 13 points and a team-high eight rebounds for Bucknell, which shot 38.9 percent from the field but made only 7 of 25 3-point attempts.
"We knew coming in that we were going to get a real tough game," said Bucknell coach Pat Flannery. "This is an excellent Rider team and they play in a great college basketball environment. Rider threw a lot of different defenses at us, which I think is going to prepare us real well for the season."
"My teammates kept my head up and encouraged me to keep shooting," said Bettencourt, who finished with nine points on 3-for-15 shooting. "They all have a lot of confidence in me. We have not had a lot of success in this gym through the years, so this was a nice way to start the season."
A hotly contested first half featured nine lead changes and three ties. Rider finished the first half on an 8-2 run and took a 29-24 lead to the locker room.
The Bison shot only 36.4 percent from the field and committed 11 turnovers, five coming on offensive fouls, in the first half. Rider shot 45.8 percent from the field in the half, with Thompson accounting for 11 of the Broncs' 29 points.
Lee scored eight of Bucknell's first 10 points of the night as the Bison grabbed a quick 10-4 lead. But the Broncs answered with seven straight points, highlighted by a Paul Johnson 3-pointer.
Bucknell outrebounded Rider 39-28, held the Broncs to only three offensive rebounds, and had 17 assists on 21 field goals.
The Bison return to action on Tuesday night against Syracuse at the Carrier Dome. Tip-off is 7 p.m.
