Men's Basketball Begins Patriot League Play on Road at Holy Cross

12/28/2022 1:45:00 PM | Men's Basketball

LEWISBURG, Pa. -- After 13 non-conference games over the last eight weeks, the records are wiped clean and Patriot League play begins on Friday with all 10 teams in action. Bucknell and Holy Cross, two original members of the Patriot League, tip off the conference's 33rd season at the Hart Center with a 2 p.m. matinee.

Despite a couple of road losses at Richmond and Rutgers before breaking for Christmas, the Bison finished the non-league slate with a winning record. Bucknell is 4-1 at home along with two more neural-site victories at the Sunshine Slam in Daytona Beach, but the Bison will be looking to improve on a 1-5 road record as Patriot League action gets started.

Holy Cross is 3-10 heading into the Patriot League slate and will be looking to snap a four-game losing skid on Friday. In their most recent outing on Dec. 22, the Crusaders fell 66-62 at Sacred Heart despite 17 points each from All-Patriot League forward Gerrale Gates and Air Force transfer Joe Octave.

Friday's game features a matchup of two of the Patriot League's top three scorers. Gates, who logged 51 points and 23 rebounds in two games against Bucknell last season, leads the conference in both scoring (17.1) and rebounding (8.3). Bucknell's Xander Rice is third in the league in scoring at 15.9 points per game, and Rice leads the league with a 2.0 assist-to-turnover ratio.

Three of Bucknell's first five Patriot League contests will be played at Sojka Pavilion, with Boston University the first to come in on Monday, Jan. 2. That will be a 2 p.m. tipoff on the national New Year's holiday.

GAME DIGEST
What: Bucknell (7-6, 0-0 PL) at Holy Cross (3-10, 0-0 PL)
Where: Hart Center, Worcester, Mass.
When: Friday, Dec. 30, 2 p.m.
Streaming: ESPN+
Local Radio: WKOK (1070 AM)
Internet Audio: BucknellBison.com
Live Stats: G oHolyCross.com
COMPLETE GAME NOTES

Bucknell Tentative Starters
G: Elvin Edmonds IV (8.4 ppg, 2.7 rpg, 2.7 apg)
G: Xander Rice (15.9 ppg, 2.6 rpg, 4.1 apg)
F: Ian Motta (7.8 ppg, 3.2 rpg, 0.9 apg)
F: Alex Timmerman (10.6 ppg, 6.4 rpg, 1.7 apg)
C: Andre Screen (11.3 ppg, 6.2 rpg, 1.1 bpg)

With a Win over Holy Cross, Bucknell Would ...

... improve to 8-6 on the season and 1-0 in the Patriot League.
... improve to 6-2 in Patriot League openers under head coach Nathan Davis, but snap a two-game losing streak in league openers.
... snap a three-game road losing streak and improve to 2-5 in true road games this season.
... improve to 49-31 all-time against Holy Cross and 13-3 under Nathan Davis.
... win for the third straight time at the Hart Center.

Headlines

Bucknell begins its 33rd season of Patriot League play on Friday afternoon at Holy Cross. In the first 32 seasons, Bucknell has posted a league-best 311-151 record with 13 regular-season titles and six Patriot League Tournament crowns.
Bucknell has dropped three of its last four games in a difficult stretch to close out non-conference play, with all three losses coming on the road against teams from the Big Ten (Rutgers) and Atlantic 10 (Richmond La Salle). Nevertheless, the Bison clinched a winning non-conference record after a 61-55 home victory over Merrimack, the preseason favorite in the Northeast Conference. This is the team's first winning non-conference slate since the 2016-17 team went into league play with an 8-5 record.
Bucknell has shot 50% or better from the field seven times in 13 games this season. The Bison had been hitting at better than a 50% clip on the season until Rutgers, featuring one of the nation's best defenses, held them to 31.0% last Friday. That dipped Bucknell's season mark to 48.5%, which still ranks 36th nationally.
Bucknell also ranks 52nd nationally in opponent field-goal percentage (.398), and the Bison are one of only 12 teams in the nation shooting over 48% while holding opponents under 40%.

NCAA Teams Shooting > 48% and Holding Teams <>
Team FG% Opponent FG%
Texas Tech .510 .396
Indiana .507 .397
UMass-Lowell .502 .364
Texas .500 .399
Florida Atlantic .493 .394
New Mexico .492 .393
Connecticut .486 .381
Bucknell .485 .398
Yale .485 .377
Milwaukee .484 .387
Kansas .483 .392
Sam Houston State .481 .350

Bucknell is shooting 39.8% from 3-point distance this season. That figure ranks 14th among all Division I teams but is only third-best in the Patriot League behind Navy (.406) and Colgate (.403). In fact, the Patriot League leads all Division I conferences in 3-point accuracy at 36.6%, just ahead of the West Coast Conference at 36.3%.
Senior Xander Rice has upped his scoring output in his senior season and comes into Friday's game as the Patriot League's third-leading scorer at 15.9 ppg. Rice has scored in double figures in every game this season and 14 straight dating back to last year.

2022-23 Patriot League Scoring Leaders
1. Gerrale Gates, Holy Cross   17.1
2. Tucker Richardson, Colgate   16.4
3. Xander Rice, Bucknell 15.9
4. Walter Whyte, Boston U. 14.5
5. Jalen Rucker, Army    14.2

Bucknell this week has benefitted from the addition to the rotation of Saint Joseph's transfer Jack Forrest. Forrest missed the first 10 games of the season due to a lower leg injury, but he has played 20+ minutes off the bench in the last three games, totaling 15 points.
Holy Cross posted a 3-10 non-league record, with all three wins coming at home against Dean, Colby-Sawyer, and Central Connecticut State. The Crusaders have dropped their last four contests, including a 66-62 decision at Sacred Heart in their most recent outing on Dec. 22. Four of Holy Cross's 10 losses are by four points or fewer, including three of the last four.
Holy Cross features one of the league's best players in fifth-year senior forward Gerrale Gates. A two-time All-Patriot League selection, Gates currently leads the Patriot League in both scoring (17.1) and rebounding (8.3). He had a 32-point, 13-rebound game against the Bison last season at the Hart Center.
The Bison were picked eighth in the Patriot League preseason coaches' poll, ahead of Holy Cross and Lafayette. Defending-champion Colgate was the preseason No. 1 pick.
Bucknell is looking to bounce back from a 9-23 season a year ago. The Bison were playing well at the end of the season, however, with an overtime win at Lafayette in the Patriot League Tournament first round capping a 3-1 stretch. Bucknell was eliminated by Colgate in the quarterfinal round.
Bucknell won eight Patriot League regular-season titles in a nine-year span from 2011-19, and the Bison went to the NCAA Tournament in 2011, 2013, 2017 and 2018 during that stretch. Now Bucknell is trying to rebound from a rare run of three straight sub-.500 seasons, something that has not happened since 2007-08 to 2009-10, although the Bison did win conference tournament games in each of the last three years.

How to Get the Game

Friday's game will stream live on ESPN+, with Kevin Gehl and Jacob VanRyn descibing the action from the Hart Center.
Veteran play-by-play man Doug Birdsong will have the local radio call on WKOK (1070 AM) in the Susquehanna Valley.
The audio feed is also available online free of charge via BucknellBison.com.
Live statistics can be accessed via GoHolyCross.com.
Follow @Bucknell_MBB for in-game updates on Twitter.

Bucknell vs. Holy Cross Series Notes

The Bucknell-Holy Cross rivalry has been one of the league's best through the years. Some of the highlights:
The Bison and Crusaders have combined to win 11 of the last 22 Patriot League titles.
These two teams have met 17 times in the 32 Patriot League Tournaments, with Bucknell winning nine of the 17. That includes four times in the championship game. Bucknell defeated Holy Cross in the 2005 and 2006 title tilts, while the Crusaders topped the Bison in the final in 1993 and 2007.
The Bison and Crusaders had never met until the formation of the Patriot League in 1990-91, but this will be the 80th meeting in 32 years. The two teams did not play during the 2020-21 season under the COVID-modified Patriot League schedule that placed them in different divisions.
Bucknell leads the series 48-31. The road team has won just 13 of the last 34, although the away side won both game in last year's set.
Bucknell is 25-12 against Holy Cross in Lewisburg and 18-6 at Sojka Pavilion. Bucknell is 18-16 vs. Holy Cross at the Hart Center, with one of the wins coming in the 2005 Patriot League championship game.
The Bison had won five straight meetings until the Crusaders prevailed 78-72 at Sojka Pavilion in the second of two contests last season. Xander Rice scored 21 points for the Bison, who trimmed an 11-point deficit to two in the final minutes before Holy Cross put the game away at the foul line. Gerrale Gates led Holy Cross with 19 points and 10 rebounds.
In last year's first meeting, Andre Screen recorded 12 points and 13 rebounds for his first career double-double in Bucknell's 68-65 win at the Hart Center. Screen clinched the game with two free throws with 4.8 seconds to play. Andrew Funk hit three critical shots in the final six minutes of the game after scoring his 1,000th career point earlier in the day. Funk tallied 14 points, Rice added 16, and Malachi Rhodes had six points and a career-high 10 rebounds. Gates carried Holy Cross with 32 points, 13 rebounds and five assists, although the Bison did limit him to two points over the final eight minutes of a tight game.

Notable Numbers

Through 13 games in 2022-23, Bucknell has been much-improved defensively over last season, when the Bison struggled to get stops. Bucknell ranks No. 1 in the Patriot League in field-goal percentage defense , second in 3-point defense, and third in scoring defense.

Scoring Defense   Opp. FG%   Opp 3FG%
2021-22   79.4     .466    .373
2022-23   66.9    .398    .329

Bucknell has held nine of its 13 opponents under 40% from the field this season. Saint Peter's (.516), La Salle (.500), Richmond (.500), and Rutgers (.493) are the only three teams to hit better than 40% against the Bison this season.
Xander Rice was named Tournament MVP of the Ocean Bracket at the Sunshine Slam during Thanksgiving Week. On Dec. 18 against Merrimack, he was held to 11 points, but he did hand out nine assists without a turnover. Rice, who leads the Patriot League in assist/TO ratio (2.0), is one of only 27 Division I players — and the only one from the Patriot League — to log nine or more assists with no turnovers in a game this season, and he is only the fourth different Bison to do it in the last 18 years.

Bucknell Players with 9+ Assists, No Turnovers (Since 2004-05)
• Abe Badmus (11A) vs. Kansas, Mar. 18, 2005 (NCAA Tournament)
• Darryl Shazier (10A) at Boston College, Dec. 22, 2010
• Darryl Shazier (9A) vs. Holy Cross, Jan. 16, 2011
• Stephen Brown (9A) vs. Lafayette, Feb. 22, 2017
• Xander Rice (9A) vs. Merrimack, Dec. 18, 2022

Last Time Out

Clifford Omoruyi recorded 17 points, 14 rebounds, and six blocked shots to lead Rutgers to an 85-50 win over visiting Bucknell last Friday at Jersey Mike's Arena.
Xander Rice scored 13 points to lead the Bison, who closed out the non-conference portion of the schedule with a 7-6 record.
Rutgers, now 8-4 overall and 8-1 at home, including a 63-48 win over No. 8 Indiana, came into the game ranked in the top-12 nationally in scoring defense, field-goal percentage defense, 3-point percentage defense, and steals. The Scarlet Knights showed off that defense in this one, holding a Bison team that came in shooting 50.1% on the season to 31.0% from the field and 7-for-25 from the 3-point arc.
Ian Motta joined Rice in double figures with 10 points, and Andre Screen finished with nine points and eight rebounds. Caleb McConnell recorded 14 points and seven assists for Rutgers, which shot 49.3% overall despite a 3-for-15 night from the arc.

Patriot League Success

Bucknell is 311-151 (.673) all-time in Patriot League regular-season games, the best record of any league team. Last year was only the sixth time in 32 years that the Bison finished with a sub-.500 PL record.
Bucknell won three straight Patriot League regular-season titles from 2011-13, becoming the first team in league history to accomplish that feat. The Bison had won five in a row and eight of the previous nine before finishing T-6th in 2019-20.
Bucknell has made nine Patriot League Tournament appearances as the No. 1 seed and seven as the No. 2 seed.
Bucknell won Patriot League Tournament titles in 2005, 2006, 2011, 2013, 2017 and 2018. The Bison have made it to the semifinals 24 times and to the championship game 13 times in the league's first 31 years.
The Bison are the only team to go unbeaten in league play in a season (14-0 in 2006).

Who's Got Next?

Bucknell rings in the new year with a home game against Boston University on Monday, Jan. 2. The 7-6 Terriers open Patriot League action at home against Navy on Friday.