After last weeks heartbreaking loss to the Bonnies (Stay classy Bonaventure fans) UB had a chance to take on their "other" local rival and Big 4 member Niagara.
Long story short UB put the Purps in their place in pretty dominating fashion. With the win UB finished 2-1 against the other 'four' members with the only loss coming on a last second shot against the Bonnies.
The Bulls followed up that by putting the Phoenix of green bay down. Bringing their season record up to a surprisingly impressive six and three. UB was picked by just about everybody to finish towards the bottom of the MAC this season. While MAC play is always difficult its easy to feel pretty good about how this years edition will fare.
Niagara:
While it Byron Mulkey who did the most damage (19 points) against Niagara Jawaan Alston shredded the purps for 16 points in just 28 minutes of play off the Bench. Niagara was down by about ten following a huge UB Run starting with eight minutes left in the first half.
Their lights out shooting in the first half (58.1 percent from the field) was only outdone by their dominant rebounding. The Bulls out rebounded Niagara 41-31 and had 11 steals, including five from Mulkey, who entered the game leading the nation at 4.1 a contest.
Zach Filzen scored 14 points and Mitchell Watt had 11 points and nine rebounds for Buffalo.
The Bulls finally got the free throw monkey off their back. 72% is not earth shattering but its a good deal better than the shooting which has cost them two of their three losses this season. Aside from bringing that offense on the road with them the free throw issues was the one are in which the Bulls were killing themselves.
Green Bay:
The second game was a rematch against Green Bay from last season. The Bulls entered as pretty big favorites and outside of a short nap at the beginning of the second half they played like it. Fitzen and Mulky would each go over 20 points but the real story of the game was Javon McCrea.
The standout freshamn took over the game inside the ten minute mark. He seemed to be involved in just about every play. Had he just naild his free throws it would have been the Perfect game off the Bench.
It was McCrea's spark that helped the bulls snap out of a skid that gave the Phoenix a ray of hope. He seemed to be a part of every play late in the second boosting hopes that he will pan out as one of the best recruits of the decade.