Box Score QUINCY, Mass. (Jan. 12) – The Nichols College men's basketball team won its second-straight game Thursday night, pulling away from Eastern Nazarene College for a 60-56 win in Commonwealth Coast Conference action. The Bison improve to 4-8 overall and 2-3 in conference action. The Lions fall to 2-10 and 1-4 in league play.

The Bison held a 40-37 advantage on the glass against the top rebounding team in the league, and parlayed 22 ENC turnovers into 19 points. 

Sophomore Ryan Sheehan led Nichols with 16 points, while rookie guard Jalen Graham added 11 points and three steals off the bench. Justin Kuntz posted a team-high eight rebounds to go with eight points and three steals.

Impressively, all 10 players who saw time on the court scored for the Bison as the Nichols reserves outscored their ENC counterparts by a 26-11 margin. 

Junior Chima Ezeigbo secured his eighth double-double of the season, tallying a game-high 18 points and 15 rebounds for the Lions. Classmate Aaron Johnson scored 11, hitting 3-6 from downtown. Sophomore Brian Hard had another good outing, contributing nine points, while teammate Mike McCoy chipped in seven points and six rebounds in 25 minutes of play. Max Barbosa and DeAngelo Alston had five assists apiece.

The Bison scored the game's first point on a free-throw from Kuntz. That would be the only lead that Nichols would secure in the half as the Lions excelled behind balanced team play. With 12:23 remaining in the stanza, a Kris Bergstol layup put the Lions up by 10, their largest lead of the game.

Nichols slowly began to work their way back, and with 5:59 they had cut the margin to six following a bucket from Sheehan. Nichols tightened up its defense, and tied it up on five consecutive points from Sheehan, and again in the final minute on an under the hoop bucket from Joe Gallant.

Coming into the second half tied 28-28, Nichols came out firing, doubling up the Lions in the opening minutes to hold a four-point lead, the Bison's largest of the game until the final minute.

With 5:56 to go in the game, the Lions grabbed their first second half lead on Johnson's third three-pointer of the game. Eastern Nazarene pulled ahead by three twice more, but the Bison refused to let up, taking back the lead for good with 3:27 left, again courtesy of Gallant.

A Graham three-point play with less than two minutes left shifted all the momentum in the favor of the Bison. Despite two late layups from Max Barbosa, the Lions failed to take advantage of opportune steals and were handed their tenth loss of the year.

Nichols continues CCC action Saturday in a 2 p.m. home game against University of New England. Eastern Nazarene travels to Western New England for a 3 p.m. conference game.

Box Score