LEWISBURG, Pa. – Junior Austin Tillotson hit two clutch shots in the final 30 seconds to hand Colgate a 71-69 victory at Bucknell here Saturday night.
 
The Raiders now jump back into a first-place tie with the Bison and hold the head-to-head advantage having taken both matchups during the regular season. The last time Colgate recorded consecutive victories over the Bison in the regular season was during the 1997-98 season.
 
With the Bison ahead by five and two minutes remaining, Tillotson took over the game, scoring Colgate's final seven points.
 
After a layup from Bucknell to increase its edge to 69-64, the junior came down and hit a jumper to make it a three-point game. Then the Raiders forced the Bison into a hard 3-point shot, and Colgate pulled down the defensive board.
 
With 30 seconds left on the clock and the shot clock winding down, Tillotson hit a huge trey in front of the Colgate bench to tie the game at 69-all.
 
The Bison then took a timeout to draw up a play with 21 seconds remaining. Unfortunately for the host team, during their next possession a Bison player ran out of bounds under the hoop and then was the first player to touch the ball thus committing a turnover.
 
Colgate took the opportunity to then use its final timeout to draw up what would be the eventual game-winning play.
 
Tillotson took the ball into his hands and rolled off two screens from Damon Sherman-Newsome and Luke Roh to hit the go-ahead jumper on the right side of the free throw line.
 
The Bison then had one final desperation attempt with 1.3 left on the clock from underneath Colgate's basket but the Raiders batted down the ball before Bucknell could get a hand on it.
 
Tillotson recorded a season-high 24 points on 10-of-13 shooting and 4-of-5 from long. Three other Raiders registered double-figures in Matt McMullen (12 points), Sherman-Newsome (11 points) and Roh (10 points). McMullen added a team-best five boards as well as handing out a team-high four assists to tie his career-best.
 
The Raiders are back on the road Thursday for a game with Holy Cross at 7 p.m. That contest will be broadcast live nationally on CBS Sports Network.
 
Colgate Heads Back To The Top Of The League
• The Raiders are now 7-3 in the Patriot League and jump back into a tie with Bucknell for tops in the conference.
• Colgate does, however, hold the tiebreaker over the Bison having defeated them as well back on Jan. 3, 68-62.
 
Bottom Line
• Colgate 71, Bucknell 69
 
Won-Lost Records
• Colgate improves to 10-13 overall and 7-3 in Patriot League play
• Bucknell dips to 12-11 and 7-3, respectively.
 
Facts & Figures
• Tillotson led all scorers with his season-high 24 points.
• The junior hit a career-best 10 field goals and matched his career-high in 3-point field goals with four.
• He also added three rebounds to go along with his two assists and one steal during his 37 minutes of action. With his two helpers, Tillotson surpassed the 100 assist mark on the season.
• The York, Pa. native has now posted back-to-back double-figure scoring games.
• McMullen chipped in 12 points after going a perfect 5-for-5 from the floor and 2-for-2 from behind the arc.
• That feat marked the second time in the last three games the senior was perfect from the floor. He also went 4-of-4 overall, 1-1 from 3-point range and 3-for-3 from the charity stripe against Loyola on Jan. 24.
• McMullen led the Raiders on the boards as well with five rebounds and a team-high four assists.
• Sherman-Newsome continued his double-figure scoring streak with 11 points in the contest.
• The senior has now hit double-digits in 21 of the Raiders 23 games so far this season and matches Ethan Jacobs for a team-best 10 consecutive.
• Roh closed out the Raiders in double-digits with 10 points, eight of which came in the second half.  
• Colgate shot 59.6 percent from the floor and 46.2 percent from long. The Raider shot an impressive 69.2 percent overall in the second half, while hitting 5-of-9 treys during that period.
• Bucknell held the slight edge on rebounds are 25-21, but Colgate scored 44 points from inside the paint compared to the Bison's 22.  
• Colgate recorded four blocks and five steals in the game as well.  
• The Bison converted 14 second-chance points, while Colgate earned 12 of its own. 
• The game saw seven tie scores to go along with its six lead changes.
• Colgate's largest lead of the game at four happened four times with the last one coming after a McMullen 3-pointer with 9:10 left to play in the first half made it a 17-13 ball game.
• The Raiders had the advantage for 12:38, while the hosts had the lead for 21:32. The game was tied for 5:49. 
 
Bucknell's Numbers
• The Bison were led by Chris Hass' 18 points. He went 5-for-10 from the floor and 5-for-6 from downtown, while converting on 3-of-6 free throws.
• Nana Foulland's 14 points and Ryan Frazier's 11 points closed out the Bucknell players in double-figures.
• The Bison shot 50 percent from the floor and a season-best 71.4 percent from downtown after hitting 10-of-14 shots.  

Interesting Notes
• After a tough loss against Lafayette on Wednesday, Colgate got back into the win column with the victory. 
• The Raiders posted back-to-back victories over the Bison for the first time since the 1997-98 season.
• Colgate also snapped Bucknell's five-game winning streak with the win.
• Sherman-Newsome recorded double-figures in the game for his team-leading 10th consecutive game. He has also hit double-digits in 21 of the Raiders 23 games so far this season.
• The only two games Sherman-Newsome missed that mark were contests in which he left the game early with an injury.
• Jacobs had his double-digit scoring streak snapped in the game. His mark stood at 10 consecutive games, which currently matches Sherman-Newsome for a season-best.
• During conference play the Raiders are shooting 51 percent from the floor and 43 percent from 3-point range.

Relive the Action
• After a back-and-forth opening 10 minutes the Raiders took their largest lead of the game, 17-13, for the last time following a trey from McMullen with 9:10 left on the clock.
• The Bison countered with a 7-0 run over the next four minutes to take over the edgeat 20-17.
• Colgate then pulled even at 25-all with two and a half minutes remaining in the opening period.
• Bucknell would again answer though with a 10-2 run to close the half and give the Bison a game-high eight-point lead heading into the break.
• The Bison held their eight-point edge for the first three minutes of the second half but Colgate would rally for an 8-1 run to make it a one-point game at 44-43.
• The hosts would hold as much as a four-point lead over Colgate over the next couple minutes but the Raiders would eventually tie it at 52-all following a layup from McMullen.
• Colgate and Bucknell then went bucket-for-bucket for most of the next six minutes with both team's holding the lead during that time.
• The Raiders then tied the game at 64-64 for the second to last time after Sherman-Newsome converted on a 3-point play with three minutes left to play.
• Unfortunately for Colgate, Hass drained a 3-pointer on the other end of the court and Ryan Frazier added a layup following a Bison steal to create a five-point deficit between the teams.
• But the Raiders would not let up as Tillotson took over the contest hitting a layup with 1:20 left, making it a one-possession game late.
•.After a missed shot from downtown by Bucknell, Tillotson hit the game-tying 3-pointer with 30 seconds left to make it 69-69.
• Colgate then needed a big stop defensively and got that – sort of. On the Bison's next possession one of their players ran out of bounds under the hoop and then was the first player to touch the ball thus committing a turnover and handing Colgate one last final attempt at the basket.
• The Raiders called a timeout to draw up a play and it worked perfectly. Tillotson took the ball in his hands and ran off of two Colgate screens to swish the game-winner with 1.3 remaining on the clock.
• Colgate then defended any last Bison attempts in the final second to put itself back into first place in the league.
 
Record's Watch
• Sherman-Newsome and Moore are still in the hunt for reaching 1,000 career points. Sherman-Newsome is 102 points shy, while Moore sits at 113 short.
• Tillotson surpassed the 100 assist mark on the season with his two helpers in Saturday's game. He recorded 133 helpers a year ago during his first season with the Maroon and White, which placed him third all-time.
• And with his assist on Saturday, Roh's career assist total shifts to 312. He is now 11 assists shy of matching Alvin Reed '06 for fourth place all-time.

Straight From The Source
• Colgate head coach Matt Langel: (on his overall thoughts from the game) "My goal for our program since day one has been to have us in position to compete for a championship."

"We've talked about it a little bit. About embracing the moment and just leaving it all out there for each other. I'm really proud of our group of guys for continuing to battle and fight through. Bucknell played a pretty good game. They hurt us inside with (Nana) Foulland, who is really going to be a tough guy to stop over the course of his career. They shot 10-of-14 from three and I thought on a lot of them we have our hands in their faces. They weren't wide-open."

"To find a way to win you obviously have to get a little bit lucky. With that call on Bucknell late, we had the same call called against us in our Loyola game when (Damon) Sherman-Newsome hit a three on the play. To be honest I haven't seen that call called all season long and now all of a sudden it has basically been back-to-back games and at critical points in the contest."
 
"I'm really proud of Austin Tillotson, who is really as good of a player that we have. He has been so instrumental in getting us to where we are but he hasn't been playing that great. The other guys, most importantly the seniors, have been kind of carrying the load while he's really been working through some things. For him to step up and have the game that he did and to make the last shot is really what we needed. The guys were thrilled for him. It's just an awesome game that we really feel good about."
 
(on the game-winning play) "I'm a believer that if you've got to get a shot, and Fran Dunphy was my coach and mentor in coaching, we would try and always give it to our best player and hope that he would be able to get a shot. You can't mess up on a pass or have any illegal screens called on you so that's typically what we like to do."

"Damon (Sherman-Newsome) came over and he said "Coach why don't we run this one play". And it's not a play that we have and he kind of said let's use me a decoy. It's no secret we've gone to him in crunch time before and he said "let me set the screen and they're not going to guard Luke (Roh), so have him set the last screen for Austin (Tillotson) coming off an he'll hit the shot." We did it and it worked (he said laughing). It's probably the best we've executed all season long and maybe it was just meant to be for us."

Up Next
• The Raiders finish off their two-game road stand at Holy Cross on Thursday.
• The Crusaders have a Monday game with American on CBS Sports Network before welcoming Colgate.
• Holy Cross sits with a 3-6 conference mark heading into Monday's contest.
• The Raiders and Crusaders will go head-to-head for their 78th all-time meeting. Holy Cross holds the 56-21 record advantage.
• Colgate took the teams earlier meeting on Cotterell Court 74-60 after Damon Sherman-Newsome put up a career-best 30 points.