Men's Basketball Resumes Play Saturday Afternoon at Home vs. Radford

LEWISBURG, Pa. -- With final exams in the rearview mirror, the Bucknell men's basketball team is now focused on the next phase of its season. First-year head coach John Griffin III challenged his team with 10 games in 24 days to begin the season, which was one of the busiest opening slates in the nation. The Bison wrapped up that stretch with a feel-good 76-67 win at Penn State on Dec. 2, and now after taking two weeks off for finals, they conclude non-league play with three games over the next three weeks, with some time off for Christmas mixed in. The rigorous early season schedule allowed Griffin and his staff to put a whole lot on film for his players, and now coming off their two best offensive performances of the season, the Bison will have time to expand on their strengths and work on their shortcomings with plenty of practice time and only one more road trip between now and the start of Patriot League play on Jan. 3.

For Bison fans, the action resumes Saturday afternoon with a return to Sojka Pavilion as the Bison take on a very good Radford team at 3:30 p.m. The game can be seen live on ESPN+, and this will be the first of six men's and women's games with a holiday half-price ticket special. Click on the image below to purchase tickets, and use the promo code RAY4SNOW to get 50% off all tickets.

GAME DIGEST
What: Radford (8-4) at Bucknell (3-7)
Where: Sojka Pavilion, Lewisburg, Pa.
When: Saturday, Dec. 16, 3:30 p.m.
Watch: ESPN+
Local Radio: WKOK 1070 AM
Internet Audio: BucknellBison.com
Live Stats: BucknellBison.com
COMPLETE GAME NOTES

Bucknell Tentative Starters
G: Josh Bascoe (9.6 ppg, 2.4 rpg, 5.4 apg)
G: Jack Forrest (16.2 ppg, 5.7 rpg, 1.4 apg)
F: Brady Muller (0.6 ppg, 0.5 rpg, 0.1 apg)
F: Ruot Bijiek (7.0 ppg, 2.2 rpg, 0.9 apg)
C: Noah Williamson (11.0 ppg, 5.6 rpg, 0.6 bpg)

With a Win over Radford, Bucknell Would ...

... win its second straight game and improve to 4-7 on the season.
... earn a win in the first game out of the final exams break for the third year in a row (Merrimack last season, La Salle in 2021-22).
... improve to 2-2 at home this season and 209-79 all-time at Sojka Pavilion.

Headlines

After playing 10 games in the first four weeks of the season — no team in the country played more games in that span — the Bison have been able to decompress a bit and focus on final exams for the last two weeks. Saturday's first-ever meeting with Radford will be Bucknell's first game action since a Dec. 2 win at Penn State, and it will be the 2,800th game in program history.
Bucknell went into the finals break on the heels of a satisfying 76-67 win at Penn State. It was the team's first win over the Nittany Lions since 2013 and snapped an eight-game losing streak to Big Ten opponents.
Just prior to the Penn State game, the Bison played very well for 32 minutes against then-unbeaten Princeton but succumbed to a 28-6 run and fell 85-71. Bucknell flipped the script three days later, outscoring Penn State 49-30 over the final 18 minutes after trailing by 10 early in the second half.
Two of Bucknell's best offensive showings of the season came in those two games leading into the break. Against Princeton and Penn State, two of the best teams on the non-conference schedule, the Bison combined to shoot 54.5% from the field (54-99) and 48.7% from 3-point range (19-39). They also had positive assist-to-turnover rates in both games. The 76 points scored at Penn State was a season high.
Jack Forrest earned Patriot League Player of the Week honors on Dec. 4 after eclipsing the 20-point mark against both Princeton (21) and Penn State (23). It was the first career PL Player of the Week honor for Forrest, who now ranks second in the Patriot League in scoring at 16.2 ppg. Forrest leads the league in free-throw percentage (.862), 3-pointers per game (2.9), and minutes per game (35.8).
During the first four games of the season junior point guard Josh Bascoe provided good support for Elvin Edmonds IV coming off the bench. Bascoe had an eight-assist game against Delaware and a 15-point game at Niagara in a reserve role. After Edmonds was injured late in the first half at La Salle, Bascoe has started and played heavy minutes in each game since. He scored a career-high 20 points in the win over Southern Indiana, and in the win over Penn State he had 11 points, 10 assists, five rebounds, and three steals. Bascoe is now tied with Colgate's Braeden Smith for the Patriot League assists lead at 5.4 apg.
The only other Bison in the last 20 years to have a game with at least 10 points, 10 assists, five rebounds, and three steals was Steven Kaspar, who went 12-10-7-3 against Navy on Jan. 15, 2014. Bascoe is the only Patriot League player with a 10-assist game this season.
Bascoe is one of only 14 players in the nation with at least four games of eight or more assists this season.

Most Games with 8+ Assists
Savion Lewis, Quinnipiac   7
Darius Brown, Utah State   6
Jaquan Carlos, Hofstra   6
Elijah Hawkins, Minnesota   5
Braden Smith, Purdue   5
Isaiah Stevens, Colorado State   5
Josh Bascoe, Bucknell   4
Rayj Dennis, Baylor   4
Dajuan Harris, Kansas   4
Daniss Jenkins, St. John's   4
Noah Reynolds, Green Bay   4
Jamal Shead, Houston   4
Stephan Swenson, Stetson   4
Rollie Worster, Utah   4

Bucknell is in the midst of its 129th season of basketball, dating back to its first game on Feb. 14, 1896, a 16-14 victory over Lock Haven.
Bucknell is looking to rebound from a 12-20 season a year ago. The Bison went 5-13 in Patriot League play and fell 64-59 at American in the first round of the Patriot League Tournament.
The Bison were picked ninth in this year's Patriot League preseason poll, one spot ahead of Army West Point. Defending-champion Colgate was the preseason No. 1 pick. John Griffin III is one of five new head coaches in the Patriot League this season.
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 four straight sub-.500 seasons, something that has not happened since 2000-01 to 2003-04.
Third-year head coach Darris Nichols has a talented and experienced squad at Radford this season. The Highlanders are 8-4 on the season after handling VMI 73-56 on Tuesday. Radford is 5-0 at home, 3-0 at neutral sites, and 0-4 in true road games. Those road contests have come against very good competition however, as the losses are against No. 19 North Carolina, VCU, No. 24 James Madison, and Old Dominion.
Radford scores 75.8 points per game and has seven players averaging at least 8.0 ppg. The Highlanders shoot 47.1% from the field and 40.1% from 3-point range as a team. That latter figure ranks 15th nationally.
Kenyon Giles has been Radford's most active offensive player. The sophomore has taken double-digit shot attempts in all but one game and leads the team in scoring at 14.3 ppg. DaQuan Smith (13.7), a former teammate of Ja Morant at Murray State, and Bryan Antoine (10.7) also score in double figures, and 6'7" forward Justin Archer nabs 8.6 rpg while shooting 74.1% from the field. The Bison will also have to keep an eye on forward Chandler Turner (9.2 ppg), who has five straight double-digit scoring games and is shooting 66.7% from the 3-point arc (16-24) on the season.

How to Get the Game

The Bucknell-Radford game will be streamed on ESPN+, with the "Voice of the Bison" Doug Birdsong joined by former Bison assistant coach Terry Conrad on the call.
Joe Vasile will provide the 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 BucknellBison.com.
Follow @Bucknell_MBB for in-game updates on Twitter.

Notable Numbers

Rebounding has been a key stat for the Bison thus far. They are +25 on the boards in their three wins, but in the seven losses Bucknell is -78 on the glass.
Bucknell has been strong from the free-throw line of late after a slow start to the season. The Bison are 62-77 (.805) from the stripe over the last five games. Center Noah Williamson has been a big part of that resurgence, as he is 23-27 (.852) during that span.
Williamson has been an X-factor for the Bison thus far. In the team's three wins, he is averaging 19.3 points and 7.0 rebounds while shooting 66.7% from the field (20-30) and 89.5% from the foul line (17-19).
Josh Bascoe is 23-for-44 (.523) from the field over his last five games.
Quin Berger is 8 for his last 14 from 3-point range after a 1-for-7 start to the season.
Pip Ajayi is 6-for-6 from the floor over his last three games.
Jack Forrest is one of only 25 guards in the nation and the only one in the Patriot League averaging at least 16.0 points and 5.7 rebounds per game.
Bucknell has shot the three much better at home (40.0%) than on the road (30.8%) this season.

Last Time Out

Bucknell overcame a 10-point second-half deficit to run past Penn State 76-67 at the Bryce Jordan Center on Dec. 2. Jack Forrest scored 23 points, Noah Williamson scored 21, and Josh Bascoe logged 11 points and a career-high 10 assists to send the Bison into the two-week final exams break on a high note.
The Bison trailed 37-27 early in the second half before outscoring the Nittany Lions 49-30 over the final 18 minutes. Bucknell shot 69.2% from the field in the second stanza and beat Penn State for the first time since a 90-80 win early in the 2013-14 season.
Forrest was the catalyst early with 16 first-half points, and then Williamson scored 15 of his 21 in the second half, finishing 9-for-13 from the field. The 7'0" center's 3-pointer from the top of the key with 2:50 to play was one of the biggest shots of the night. It gave the Bison a 64-62 lead, and after Nick Kern split a pair of free throws, Williamson scored in the lane off a feed from Bascoe. Qudus Wahab, who had 18 points for Penn State, missed two free throws, and then Quin Berger hit a dagger three in the right corner on his first shot attempt of the game to stretch the margin to 69-63 with 1:35 to go. Bucknell went 5-for-6 at the foul line to build on the lead, and Williamson put an exclamation point on the day with a dunk in the final 10 seconds.
Bucknell shot a season-high 58.0% from the field, including 10-for-21 accuracy from the 3-point arc. The Bison outrebounded Penn State 25-24 and had 15 assists against 14 turnovers against a high-pressure defense that came in ranked 15th nationally in forcing turnovers (17.1).
Ruot Bijiek and Ian Motta both added eight points for Bucknell, and Bascoe and Forrest combined for six of the team's 10 steals. The Bison were +4 in the steals category in the game.

Bucknell vs. Radford Series Notes

This will be the very first meeting between the Bison and the Highlanders.
Not only have the Bison never before played Radford, but they have only played one of the nine teams that currently make up the Big South Conference. Bucknell is 2-0 against Presbyterian, including a 66-65 win over the Blue Hose last season at the Sunshine Slam in Daytona Beach, Fla.

Who's Got Next?

After hosting Radford on Saturday, Bucknell will be down to just two non-conference games remaining. The Bison travel to Merrimack on Friday, Dec. 22 and then host Saint Peter's on Saturday, Dec. 30.
Bucknell and Merrimack met for the first time last season, with the Bison winning 61-55 at Sojka Pavilion.

Men's Basketball Resumes Play Saturday Afternoon at Home vs. Radford

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Pip Ajayi

Josh Bascoe

Quin Berger

Ruot Bijiek

Elvin Edmonds IV

Jack Forrest

Ian Motta

Brady Muller

Noah Williamson

Men's Basketball Resumes Play Saturday Afternoon at Home vs. Radford

Next Event

Players Mentioned

Pip Ajayi

Josh Bascoe

Quin Berger

Ruot Bijiek

Elvin Edmonds IV

Jack Forrest

Ian Motta

Brady Muller

Noah Williamson

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