John Paul Kromka scored 20 points and grabbed six rebounds to help the Mountain Cats battle back from a second half deficit at third-ranked Indiana (PA), but the Crimson Hawks were able to hold off Pitt-Johnstown, 86-73, Saturday night at the Kovalchick Center in Indiana. The Mountain Cats had their four-game winning streak snapped and slipped to 9-4 overall and 4-2 in the PSAC Western Division.
IUP connected on its first three 3-pointers and got baskets from Willem Brandwijk and Malik Miller top open-up a 17-8 lead seven minutes into the opening half.
Pitt-Johnstown battled back to narrow it to two on two occasions.
Josh Wise's bucket made it 17-15, before a
Fred Mulbah steal and layup got the Mountain Cats to back to within two at 17-15.
Four minutes later, Miller's 3-pointer capped an 11-0 Crimson Hawks' run that rebuilt the lead to 13 at 5:19, but Kromka completed a 3-point-play to get Pitt-Johnstown back to within nine at 31-22.
However, after
Jared Jakubick hit a 3-pointer to get the Mountain Cat deficit back down to a dozen, IUP's Dante Lombardi nailed a 3-pointer with :05 left to give the Crimson Hawks a 44-29 halftime advantage.
IUP pushed its lead out to 58-37 just over four minutes into the second half on 3-pointers from Greg Beraer and Jacobo Diaz and a basket in the paint from Brandwijk.
Pitt-Johnstown did not go away. The Mountain Cats countered with a 15-5 run, closed out by 3-pointers from Wise and
Joe Batt, to pull back to within 11 at 63-52 with 10:29 to play.
Jakubick's free-throws at 3:54 kept the Pitt-Johnstown deficit at 11, and
Caiden Landis' tip-in with a minute to go made it 81-71.
That was as close as the Mountain Cats could get. The Crimson Hawks got the lead back out to 15 and went on the to the 13-point victory.
Kromka's 20 points and six rebounds paced four Mountain Cats who scored in double figures. Wise had 14 points and five rebounds, while Landis scored 12 points and pulled down six rebounds, and Batt had 11 points. Pitt-Johnstown also got eight points from Jakubick.
The Mountain Cats shot an even 50% (31-62) from the floor, but just 4-13 from 3-point range, while IUP shot 48.6% (35-72) but made 10-30 from behind the arc. Pitt-Johnstown was 7-8 from the free-throw line and IUP was 6-8.
Miller finished with a game-high 25 points and Brandwijk had 21 points and a game-high nine rebounds to lead IUP. The Crimson Hawks, who improved to 13-0 overall and 6-0 in the PSAC West, also got 15 points from Diaz and 13 points and a game-high 12 assists from Lombardi.
The Mountain Cats travel to Gannon for a PSAC game on Wednesday, before returning home to host conference games with the Mountain Cat women's team against Edinboro on January 12 and California (PA) on January 16 in the Sports Center.
