Boxscore

KUTZTOWN, Pa. – Luis Leao led three Lakers in double-figures to help the Mercyhurst College men's basketball team to its fourth-straight victory with a 67-57 win at Kutztown in a Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference crossover contest.

The win moves the Lakers to 8-1 while the Golden Bears fall to 6-3 on the year. Despite the contest against a PSAC opponent, the game contest does not count towards the teams' divisional records, only the overall records.

Leao was one of a few players for either team that had a strong shooting night with his 14 points on 6-of-12 from the floor to go along with a game-high 15 rebounds. Two other Lakers in Heiden Ratner and Shelton Jackson also tallied double-digit efforts with 15 and 13 markers, respectively.

In the Lakers first contest since Dec. 15, 2010, they struggled to find an offensive rhythm, and for that matter, so did the Golden Bears.

The Lakers shot just 44.6 percent from the floor, hitting 25-of-56 field goals while the Golden Bears went just 22-of-55 for 40 percent. Both teams struggled from behind the arc as well, with Mercyhurst going 3-for-20 and Kutztown hitting 2-of-12. At the charity stripe, neither team made more than 64 percent.

In the first half, the Lakers led by as many as six in the opening 10 minutes before the Golden Bears reclaimed the lead shortly thereafter. As Mercyhurst took the lead back with 3:48 remaining in the opening stanza, the two teams then battled tightly for the final minutes. Trailing by three with 1:14 left, Iddo Cohen's layup with 56 seconds left cut the Golden Bears' lead to one, 26-25, before Leao grabbed a defensive board and made a layup with one second left to send the Lakers into halftime with a one-point advantage, 27-26.

A minute into the final stanza, Kutztown knotted the game at 29-29 but the Lakers responded with a 7-2 run to build a five-point advantage at 16:30 and would never trail in the game again as the Golden Bears would get no closer than seven.

Next up for the Lakers is another PSAC crossover contest tomorrow, Jan. 4, at East Stroudsburg. Tip-off is set for 8 p.m.