It was quite the evening for Pitt-Johnstown coach Mike Drahos and his squad.

Pitt-Johnstown's steady second half surge allowed the Mountain Cats to pull away late to close out a 70-60 victory over Mercyhurst and give 10th-year head coach Drahos his 100th career win at the helm of the program.

In addition to helping their coach reach a milestone, the Mountain Cats (12-6, 9-3 PSAC) extended their winning streak to four games and took sole possession of second place in the PSAC Western Division. The Cats are just one win shy of matching last year's win total with 10 games still to go.

Olivia Fasick paced Pitt-Johnstown with a game-high 21 points, which included four 3-pointers. She also added a game-high six assists to pair with six rebounds. Ashley Norling, who shot 12 of 13 from the free throw line, provided 20 points and a team-high seven rebounds.

Behind timely shooting and a tenacious defense, the Mountain Cats stayed at arm's length of the Lakers for nearly the entirety of the fourth quarter.

Mercyhurst opened the final quarter with a three to climb within two at 46-44, but a deep three by Hayden Taylor a little more than a minute later pushed the lead back to five with 7:56 to go. 

Roughly three minutes later with the Cats still up by five, Peyton Alazaus drilled a three that was followed by Taylor's steal and ensuing layup to put Pitt-Johnstown up by 10 with just 4:46 remaining. 

Taylor finished with 12 points on 5 of 10 shooting to go along with two rebounds, two assists and two steals. Alazaus chipped in nine points and grabbed five rebounds.

The Mountain Cats shot 45.8% (11 of 24) from the floor over the final 20 minutes, while holding the Lakers to just a 29.1% (7 of 24) clip. The key difference, though, came from beyond the arc where Pitt-Johnstown outshot Mercyhurst 50% (8 of 16) to 25% (5 of 20).

Pitt-Johnstown went into halftime down 31-30, but eventually bounced back to take the lead for good when Fasick scored on a layup to make it 43-41 with 2:13 remaining in the third.

Julia Buchman scored a team-high 18 points on 6 of 11 shooting for the Lakers, who fell to 10-8 (6-6 PSAC).

The Mountain Cats visit Edinboro on Wednesday. Tip-off is set for 5:30 p.m.