Baden Forup scored 25 points and pulled down a career-high 18 rebounds, and Vinnie Cugini added 20 points, but Clarion was able to hold on for an 84-79 PSAC West victory over Pitt-Johnstown, Saturday afternoon in Clarion.
 
Forup, who secured a double-double in the opening half, shot 12-15 from the floor and 1-2 from the line, while Cugini was 8-13 from the field with two 3-pointers and 2-2 from the line to lead the Mountain Cats.  Adam Bilinsky made three 3-pointers and finished with 15 points, and Cedric Rault had eight points, including 6-8 from the charity stripe for Pitt-Johnstown, now 10-8 overall and 4-6 in conference-play.
 
In a back-and-forth first half, Clarion got off to a hot start and used three 3-pointers from Trey Nelson to jump out to an early double-digit lead.  Pitt-Johnstown answered right back with eight consecutive points from Cugini in a 13-0 run over the next five minutes to give the Mountain Cats a 16-13 advantage.
 
After the Golden Eagles regained the lead by five on Aydan Cunningham's conventional 3-point play, Pitt-Johnstown outscored Clarion 13-4 to go back on top by four.  Will Kromka's 3-pointer at 6:20 knotted it at 27, and Forup, who collected 15 points and 12 boards in the first half alone, followed with a tip-in 2:19 later to make it 31-27.
 
The teams continued to exchange the lead, before a late Gavin Cote basket put Clarion back in front, 38-37 at the half.
 
Buckets from Bilinsky and Forup briefly gave the lead back to the Mountain Cats at 52-51 at the 14:26 mark of the second half.  The Golden Eagles hit three of their next four from the floor, including Justice Easter's 3-pointer and Cunningham's putback, to rebuild the lead to nine at 61-52 at the under-12 timeout.
 
The Mountain Cats battled back again.  Pitt-Johnstown narrowed it to one on five occasions, then Rault made four straight free-throws to give the Mountain Cats the lead, 72-69, with 5:53 to play.
 
However, Clarion clawed back to regain the lead, the hit 5-of-6 down the stretch to hold on for the narrow win.
 
Pitt-Johnstown, tops in the PSAC and second in the country in field goal percentage, shot an impressive 54.5% (30-55) and 6-12 from behind the arc, while holding Clarion to just 43.1% (31-72) ad 9-27 from 3-point range.  The Mountain Cats made 13 of their 16 free-throws.  Clarion was 13-19 from the stripe.
 
Nelson's game-highs of 29 points and 10 assists and Jeremy Thomas II's 21 points and 13 rebounds paced four Clarion double figure scorers and helped the Golden Eagles improve to 10-8 overall and 5-5 in the PSAC.
 
Pitt-Johnstown returns home to celebrate Winterfest Weekend with a PSAC Western Division doubleheader with the women's team against nationally-ranked Gannon Saturday afternoon in the Sports Center, before hosting another conference doubleheader against Seton Hill on Jan. 28.