NEW YORK CITY – Senior Ethan Jacobs and the Colgate Raiders sparked a rally in the final two minutes of play but it wasn't enough to complete the comeback.
 
The Raiders fell in a hard-fought battle to host Columbia 69-64.
 
After a forced turnover with eight seconds left, Colgate had a great look to tie the game from its hot-handed shooter Jacobs, who notched a career-best 26 points in the contest.
 
Unfortunately, his 3-point attempt rattled in and out and the Raiders ultimately lost by five after two made free throws from the Lions on the other end of the court.

With Sunday's outcome, Colgate has now dropped eight of its 10 losses by seven or fewer points with only those two other losses coming at the hands of No. 14 Ohio State and Syracuse.
 
Jacobs led the Raiders with a game-high 26 points after going 9-for-18 from the floor. He also recorded five makes from behind the arc to match his career-best from long.
 
Matt McMullen, Austin Tillotson and Luke Roh reached double-figures as well with 12, 10 and 10 points, respectively. McMullen was one rebound shy of matching his season-best with seven boards in the game, while Tillotson handed out a team-high five assists.
 
The Raiders closed out their out-of-conference slate and now shift their attention to Lehigh for their league opener on Wednesday. That game is scheduled for a 2 p.m. away start.

Bottom Line
• Columbia 69, Colgate 64
 
Won-Lost Records
• Columbia shifts its record to 7-4
• Colgate drops to 3-10 on the year
 
Facts & Figures
• Jacobs posted a game-high 26 points in the contest after going 9-for-18 from the floor, 5-for-10 from long and 3-for-4 from the charity stripe.
• McMullen registered double-figures with 12 points, while Roh and Tillotson closed out the Raider scorers in double-digits with 10 points each.  
• McMullen was one rebound shy of matching his season-best eight boards in the contest. Roh added four rebounds to the Raiders' final total as well.
• Tillotson handed out a team-best five helpers to go along with Jacobs' team-high two blocks.
• Overall Colgate shot 52.2 percent from the floor and a season-best 53.3 percent from behind the arc. Columbia finished shooting 48 and 43 percent, respectively.
• The Lions knocked down nine treys to Colgate's eight and outrebounded the Raiders 33-16, including a 13-to-3 edge on the offensive boards.
• Columbia earned 16 assists to Colgate's 11 with 10 of the Lions' helpers coming from Isaac Cohen.
• Colgate converted 28 points from inside the paint, while scoring 19 points off of Lions turnovers. Columbia, however, scored 10 points from second chance opportunities to go along with their 17-0 edge on bench points.
• The Lions were led by junior Maodo Lo, who notched a team-best 15 points after going 4-for-9 from the floor, 3-for-5 from long and 4-for-4 from the free throw line. Three other Columbia players reached double-figures in Cory Osetkowski (14 points), Steve Frankoski (13 points) and Kyle Castlin (12 points).
• Columbia also saw Cohen lead the team on the boards with eight rebounds and 10 assists.
• The game saw five tie scores and 13 lead changes.
• Columbia had the largest lead of the game with one minute and 30 seconds left when the score was 65-53 after Jeff Coby hit two free throws.
• The Raiders had the lead for 13:04, while the Lions held the edge for 23:23. The game was tied for 3:27.
 
Game Recap
• Both teams started the contest shooting well from the floor as the game had four tie scores in the opening 12 minutes of play.
• McMullen drained a trey with one minute and 37 seconds remaining in the half to give Colgate the slight edge at the break, 33-31.
• During the opening 20 minutes, neither team held larger than a five-point lead.
• Colgate then held a one-point advantage with after Jacobs hit a 3-pointer early in the second half but a 10-2 run over a four-minute span gave the host's the 48-41 lead.
• After two makes from the free throw line by Coby created a 12-point edge for Columbia with one minute and 30 seconds remaining, Colgate went on an 11-2 run to make it a one possession game with eight seconds left. During that time, the Raiders forced the Lions to turn the ball over four times.
• One of those turnovers was huge as it gave the Raiders a chance to tie the game.
• Colgate found Jacobs at the top of the 3-point line, where the senior fired up a shot. The attempt looked as if it would fall but it took an unfortunate bounce in and out of the basket dropping at the hands of Lo.
• Colgate was then forced to foul and with two makes on the other end of the court ultimately dropped the close contest.

Interesting Notes
• Colgate dropped its eighth contest of the year by seven or fewer points.
• Tillotson has now reached double-figures in 12 of Colgate's 13 games so far this year.
• Damon Sherman-Newsome had his double-figure scoring streak halted in the contest after leaving the game with an ankle injury just eight minutes in.

Straight From The Source
• Colgate head coach Matt Langel: (on his general thoughts from Sunday's game) "Columbia's got a really good team. They've got a special player in Maodo Lo and then they have a bunch of guys who on any given night can step up and make the other team pay in a variety of different ways. That's what happened to us this afternoon. Obviously losing Damon (Sherman-Newsome) eight minutes in was hard as we are already short-handed with Pat Moore and Nathan Harries still not entirely healthy. Having Damon go out really hurt us on both ends of the floor but you have to suck it up and try to compete. We did that, but Osetkowski hurt us inside as he had a little bit of a bigger game than he typically does and then Cohen really impacted the game for them. He had some loose ball rebounds and great passes that really made the difference."
 
"Again, another close defeat which hurts. My job is to kind of get us over this hump and keep us committed to getting better day-by-day so we can be ready for league play and the long haul of the season."
 
(On four players reaching double-figures, including Jacobs with a career-high 26 points) "Those four guys played a lot of the minutes so you have to rely on them with our bench a little bit thin in Damon's absence especially. The style that Columbia plays isn't really an up-tempo game. They slow it down and we had some guys with experience guarding that style today. Offensively we played pretty well. Obviously on the defensive end, they missed 27 times and got 13 offensive rebounds, that makes it really hard on your offense when you can't come up with some of those key rebounds."

Up Next
• Colgate now heads into conference play with its first league matchup of the year on Dec. 31 at Lehigh. That contest is scheduled for a 2 p.m. tip.
• The Mountain Hawks have one last game before they welcome the Raiders with a game at UMBC on Sunday at 5 p.m.
• The Raiders and Mountain Hawks will go head-to-head for their 85th all-time meeting. Colgate holds the 49-35 record advantage.
• These two teams split their two meetings last year with the Mountain Hawks stealing a 88-81 double overtime thriller on Cotterell Court before the Raiders closed their regular season with a 74-57 away triumph.