Men's Basketball Takes on League-Leader Colgate Saturday in Hamilton

LEWISBURG, Pa. -- Bucknell looks to shake a two-game losing streak when it travels to Colgate for a Saturday afternoon tilt at Cotterell Court. Playing without the services of two starters, the Bison fell in overtime to Lehigh in their most recent game on Monday. It was the third OT loss in Patriot League play for the Bison, who are now in fourth place at 7-6.

Bucknell faces a stern test on Saturday against one of the hottest teams in the country. Colgate has won 10 straight games, which trails only a pair of 13-game streaks from UConn and Saint Mary's for the longest active run in the nation. The Raiders' streak started with an 84-73 win at Sojka Pavilion on Jan. 13, and at 12-1 they now have a three-game lead over Lafayette at the top of the Patriot League standings.

The Bison have been a solid road team this year, with a 4-2 mark away from home in league play. That record will be put to the test in the coming days, as Bucknell follows up the trip to Colgate with a rare mid-week trek to Holy Cross on Wednesday. The Crusaders have been playing better basketball of late, winning three of their last five under coach Dave Paulsen to move into a tie for sixth place in the standings. Holy Cross hosts Army on Saturday before the Bison come to town.

Only five games remain in the regular season, and Bucknell has two more home dates coming up against Army on Sunday, Feb. 25, and against Lafayette on Saturday, March 2. The Army game will be First Responder and Military Appreciation Day as well as NBA Day at Sojka Pavilion. The Lafayette game is the regular-season finale, and the program will celebrate Senior Night and Fan Appreciation Night during the 7 p.m. affair.

GAME DIGEST
What: Bucknell (10-16, 7-6 PL) at Colgate (18-8, 12-1 PL)
Where: Cotterell Court, Hamilton, N.Y.
When: Saturday, Feb. 17, 2 p.m.
Watch: ESPN+
Local Radio: The Valley 100.9 FM
Internet Audio: BucknellBison.com
Live Stats: ColgateAthletics.com
COMPLETE GAME NOTES

With a Win over Colgate, Bucknell Would ...

... snap a two-game losing streak and improve to 11-16 overall and 8-6 in the Patriot League.
... snap a seven-game series losing streak to the Raiders and a seven-game skid at Cotterell Court.
... win its second straight road game and improve to 5-2 on the road in Patriot League play.
... pick up win No. 1,499 in team history.

Headlines

After winning three straight games to improve to 6-3 in the Patriot League, Bucknell has suddenly dropped three of its last four. After beating Navy on the road on Feb. 7, the Bison sat in a tie for third place in the Patriot League with a three-game cushion over the fifth-place teams. Now that margin is down to one game, as the 7-6 Bison sit in the No. 4 spot, just ahead of 6-7 Lehigh.
Injuries have been impactful across the Patriot League this season, and Bucknell has not been immune. Starting guard Josh Bascoe has missed the last eight games, and starting center Noah Williamson sat out the most recent game against Lehigh. All told, Bucknell has lost 50 man games due to injury in 2023-24.

Bucknell Games Lost to Injury, 2023-24
Josh Fulton    26
Quin Berger 9
Josh Bascoe   8
Elvin Edmonds IV 6
Noah Williamson   1

Overtime has not been friendly to the Bison this season. Of Bucknell's six Patriot League losses, three have come in overtime. In those three OT periods, the Bison are a combined 5-for-22 (.227) from the field and have been outscored 35-15.
Jack Forrest has led the Patriot League in scoring for much of the season, and just this week he dipped to second after being "held" to 16 points against Lehigh. Forrest averages 16.7 ppg, just behind Loyola's Deon Perry at 16.8 ppg (the two are separated by three points over 26 games). Forrest is vying to become Bucknell's first Patriot League scoring champion since Zach Thomas in 2017-18. Forrest, who has scored in double figures in all but one game, has carried a heavy minutes load this season. He ranks 15th nationally in minutes per game (36.5), and on Feb. 7 at Navy he became the first Bison to play all 40 minutes in a game since Bryan Cohen against Delaware in 2009. Teammate Elvin Edmonds IV ranks second in the Patriot League in workload at 33.9 mpg.
Edmonds has been on an assists flurry in recent weeks. He dished out a career-high 12 dimes at Navy, his third double-digit assist performance in the last seven games. The first of those was a 10-assist game at Boston University, and he also handed out 10 at Army. Edmonds is averaging 5.8 apg in Patriot League play, the second-best figure in the league behind Colgate's Braeden Smith (6.6). The 12 assists were the most by a Bison since Jimmy Sotos had 12 in a win over UNLV at the 2018 Diamond Head Classic in Honolulu. Edmonds played the role of scorer and rebounder in Monday's game against Lehigh. He set career highs with 20 points and 10 rebounds for his third double-double of the season.
Bucknell has been solid on the road in league play, posting a 4-2 record with both losses coming in overtime at second-place Lafayette and third-place American. The Bison are normally very difficult to beat at home, but this season they are just 4-8 at Sojka Pavilion and 3-3 in the league. In Patriot League play, Bucknell has actually shot the basketball much better on the road.

Bucknell Offense in Patriot League Games
FG%   3FG%    FT%    PPG
HOME   .424   .353   .669   67.0
AWAY   .463   .401   .747   73.8

Bucknell will play its next two games on the road. The Bison have a tough test coming up on Saturday against a red-hot Colgate team that has opened up a three-game lead over Lafayette atop the PL standings. The Raiders have won 10 straight games, which is tied for the third-longest active streak in the nation, trailing only Connecticut and Saint Mary's, who have both won 13 straight. South Florida is also on a 10-game heater.
Colgate's winning streak began at Sojka Pavilion on Jan. 13. The Raiders, coming off a home loss to Lafayette, defeated Bucknell 84-73 and have not lost since. Eight of the 10 wins in this streak have been by double-digit margins, including the last six.
The three-time defending Patriot League champ has a very balanced lineup this season. Braeden Smith leads the team in scoring at 12.8 ppg, and eight players average at least 5.0 ppg. The Raiders had six double-figure scorers in the first meeting with Bucknell. Smith also paces the Patriot League with 5.9 assists per game, and Chandler Baker is the top 3-point marksman at 44.0%. As a team, Colgate leads the Patriot League in field-goal percentage (.461) and FG% defense (.412), as well as 3-point percentage (.378) and 3FG% defense (.305).
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. 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.

How to Get the Game

The Bucknell-Colgate game will be streamed on ESPN+, with Eric Malanoski handling the play-by-play duties from Cotterell Court.
"Voice of the Bison" Doug Birdsong will have the local radio call on The Valley 100.9 FM in the Susquehanna Valley.
The audio feed is also available online free of charge via BucknellBison.com.
Live statistics can be accessed via ColgateAthletics.com.
Follow @Bucknell_MBB for in-game updates on Twitter.

Notable Numbers

Bucknell had been the Patriot League's best free-throw shooting team all season and ranked as high as 25th nationally at 76.6% going into the Lafayette game on Jan. 20. But the Bison have struggled at the stripe all the sudden, hitting 80 of 127 (.630) over the last seven games. Missed free throws in the final seconds of regulation proved costly in the overtime losses at Lafayette and American.
Bucknell went 15-for-15 from the foul line against Radford on Dec. 16 and 13-for-13 from the stripe at Boston University. The Bison are one of only three Division I teams to have two perfect free-throw shooting games with at least 10 attempts, joining Wisconsin (14-14 vs. Michigan State; 12-12 vs. Providence) and Stetson (12-12 vs. Johnson; 11-11 vs. Charlotte).
Jack Forrest and Josh Bascoe against Lehigh became the first Bison tandem to both score at least 23 points in a game since Nate Sestina (25) and Kimbal Mackenzie (23) did it against the Mountain Hawks in a 97-75 win in the 2019 Patriot League Tournament semifinals.
Bascoe in the win over Penn State had 11 points, 10 assists, five rebounds, and three steals. The only other Bison besides Bascoe 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.
Elvin Edmonds' line of 12 points, 10 assists, and seven rebounds at Boston University was also the first such game since Kaspar's 2014 performance at Navy.
Forrest needs only one more 3-pointer to join the top-10 on Bucknell's single-season charts.

3-POINT FIELD GOALS MADE, SEASON
1. Bryson Johnson 2010-11   99
2. Andrew Funk 2021-22   87
3. Bryson Johnson 2011-12   84
4. Kimbal Mackenzie    2018-19   83
5. Chris Hass 2014-15   82
6. Kevin Bettencourt   2005-06   79
   John Griffin 2007-08   79
8. Kevin Bettencourt   2004-05   78
9. Bryson Johnson 2012-13   73
10.J.R. Holden 1996-97   72
   Kevin Bettencourt   2003-04   72
   Jack Forrest 2023-24   71

Last Time Out

Elvin Edmonds IV set career highs with 20 points and 10 rebounds, but the shorthanded Bison dropped a 71-63 overtime decision to Lehigh on Monday night at Sojka Pavilion.
The Bison took a 59-58 lead with 25.9 seconds to go in regulation on a Jack Forrest three-pointer. The Mountain Hawks tied it on a Dominic Parolin free throw with 12.3 seconds remaining, and Forrest's contested jumper was off the mark as time expired in regulation. Tyler Whitney-Sidney converted a 3-point play on the first possession of overtime, and Lehigh never trailed in the extra session as the Bison went 1-for-7 from the field.
Forrest scored all 16 of his points in the second half and overtime after sitting out most of the first half with foul trouble. Ian Motta added eight points and a career-high nine rebounds, Pip Ajayi tied season-highs with eight points and three blocks, and Ruot Bijiek contributed six points, five rebounds, and a career-high tying four blocks.
The Bison played without 7-foot center Noah Williamson and starting guard Josh Bascoe due to injury. Those two combined for 41 points in Bucknell's 86-80 win at Lehigh on Jan. 10.

Bucknell vs. Colgate Series Notes

This will be the 124th all-time meeting between Bucknell and Colgate in a series that dates back 104 years to 1920. The Bison have a 69-54 series lead. The only other opponents that Bucknell has played at least 100 times are Lehigh (186), Lafayette (178), Gettysburg (126) and Penn State (105).
As Patriot League rivals, Bucknell is 48-28, including 28-8 in Lewisburg.
These two teams recently met in back-to-back Patriot League championship games. Bucknell won 83-54 in the 2018 title tilt at Sojka Pavilion, and Colgate returned the favor with a 94-80 win at Cotterell Court in 2019.
Colgate has won seven straight and 10 of the last 11 in the series. Bucknell's last win was a 71-70 verdict at Sojka Pavilion late in the 2019-20 regular season. Its last win in Hamilton was a 63-51 verdict on Jan. 15, 2018.
The Raiders won this year's first meeting 84-73 at Sojka Pavilion on Jan. 13. The game was tied in the late stages of the first half, but Brady Cummins beat the buzzer with a 3-pointer, and then Colgate scored the first eight points of the second half for an 11-0 run. Jack Forrest and Elvin Edmonds IV scored 17 points for Bucknell, while Braeden Smith led six Raiders in double figures with 14 to go with nine rebounds and six assists.

Who's Got Next?

Bucknell makes a long mid-week trip to Holy Cross on Wednesday, looking for the season sweep of the Crusaders and former Bison head coach Dave Paulsen. Bucknell won 70-58 in the Patriot League opener back on Jan. 3.