Bloomsburg Falls to Millersville in Men's Basketball

BLOOMSBURG-- The Bloomsburg University men's basketball team nearly overcame a 17-point halftime deficit, but fell short in its rally and lost 84-76 to Millersville University Wednesday night in Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference Eastern Division play.

The Huskies (9-13, 1-7 PSAC East) fell behind 18-5 in the first seven minutes of the game and later saw the deficit grow to 19 points, 44-25, late in the first half on a basket by Millersville's (20-3, 6-2 PSAC East) Charlie Parker. However, two free throws from the Huskies' Drew Jerry (Philadelphia/Olney) with a minute left in the half left Bloomsburg trailing by 17 at the break.

In the second half the Huskies briefly got the lead back down to 12 at 54-42 before the Marauders got a three-pointer and three-point play to back in front 60-43 with 13:27 to play.

Bloomsburg's Jaren Burdine (Reading/Reading) then caught fire and led a 14-1 rally for the Huskies to cut the lead down to 61-57 with 10:53 to play in the game. In the run, Burdine nailed three, 3-pointers and a layup, while Niko Taykov (Bulgaria) added a four points for the Huskies in the rally which took less than two minutes.

Millersville, though, used an 8-0 run to push lead back to double digits at 69-57 before Bloomsburg once again rallied. In the Huskies 12-2 run Nick Jones (Rosedale, NY/St. Francis) nailed four free throws and after the second of Drew Jerry's back-to-back layups, Bloomsburg trailed just 71-69 with 4:49 to play.

Later with the score 74-72 in favor of the Marauders, the visitors scored five straight points to regain a nine-point advantage, 81-72 with just 1:09 to play. A Buddy Rose (Philadelphia/Mastbaum Tech) layup and a jumper from Traykov with 22 seconds left, cut the deficit to just five points, but the Marauders hit three of their final four free throws for the eight point victory.

Bloomsburg was led Jerry with 15 points, while Burdine finished with 13, Billy Bryan (Denver/Holy Name) 12 and Nick Jones 10 off the bench.

Millersville was led in scoring by Parker and Reggie Bates with 16 points each, while Bernard Brown added 15.

Bloomsburg will return to action on Saturday at 3 p.m. hosting Kutztown University.