Successful basketball teams have their best players make clutch plays at the most important times in the biggest games. In the North Eastern Athletic Conference, there was no bigger game on Saturday than in Cobleskill, N.Y. where the top two teams in the conference, Lancaster Bible and SUNY Cobleskill squared off with probable home court advantage throughout the NEAC playoffs on the line. And it was in Saturday's game that saw the reigning Conference Player of the Year hit the biggest shot of the season thus far for Lancaster Bible as senior Albert Suniga hit a layup with 0.7 seconds to go that propelled the Chargers past the Fighting Tigers, 55-54.

The victory improves the Chargers to 20-2 overall and 14-1 in NEAC play. Lancaster Bible now owns a win against each team in the NEAC North Division and thus will be the host of the NEAC Final Four should they win the NEAC South Division. The Chargers lead the NEAC South Division by 2 1/2 games over Gallaudet who was idle on Saturday. The Chargers have three games remaining, while the Bison will play four games next week during the final week of the regular season which is slated to end next Saturday. 

As mentioned above, Saturday's win was the 20th of the season for the Chargers who have now won 20 games in back-to-back seasons after never winning 20 games in a season during the program's first 41 years of existence. 

While Saturday's game will not go into any instructional books on how to play perfect basketball (the teams combined for 39 turnovers), it was a high-intensity game that saw both teams make extended scoring runs and just miss putting its opponents away for good. SUNY Cobleskill opened the game on a 5-0 run, but the Chargers quickly erased that with a 10-1 run of their own as Lancaster Bible led 10-6 just over five minutes into the game. 

The teams settled in after that and over the next 10 minutes the teams traded buckets. With the Fighting Tigers trailing by five, Alexis Nunez hit a jumper with 8:14 remaining to make it 19-16 in favor Lancaster Bible. It would be the last bucket for SUNY Cobleskill for over six minutes as Lancaster Bible used a 6-1 run over that time to increase its lead to 25-17. Brian Jackson finally broke the streak for SUNY Cobleskill, butCJ Dunston scored the final three points of the half for the Chargers and the visitors took a 28-19 lead into halftime.

Any momentum the Chargers carried over to the second half quickly evaporated as SUNY Cobleskill opened the second half with a 9-2 run in the first 4:40 of the second half. Lancaster Bible regained its footing and restored a seven-point lead thanks to a 3-pointer from Naheer Mirza with 13:07 to play. The Fighting Tigers answered right back and finally tied the game at 39-39 thanks to a layup from Travis Woods with 9:30 to play. The score remained tied at 39-39 for almost three minutes before Cortrell King gave SUNY Cobleskill its first lead since early in the first half on a layup with 6:47 to play. 

Dondre Perry's free throws tied the game at 41-41, but King scored three points over the next two possessions for SUNY Cobleskill to give the home team a 44-41 lead with 5:18 to play. Mirza tied the game two possessions later for the Chargers as he knocked down one of his three 3-pointers of the day with 3:41 to play. Two free throws and a jumper from Alexis Nunez gave SUNY Cobleskill a four-point lead with 3:04 remaining. Suniga quickly cut the deficit to two with a layup 13 seconds later and was fouled. Suniga missed the ensuing free throw, but senior Corey Leonard grabbed the offensive board and Suniga was fouled again and this time drained both free throws to tie the game at 48-48 with 2:39 to play.

"That was a huge rebound by Corey at that time of the game," Lancaster Bible Head Coach Marshall Taguesaid. "It was basically a four-point swing there with Albert getting the layup and then having a chance to knock down two free throws. It was just a big play in the game for us and Corey did a great job in that moment."

Once again however, the Fighting Tigers scored on their next two possessions and re-took a four-point lead with 1:37 to play. Dunston hit two free throws for the Chargers on their next time down the floor and Leonard hit 1-of-2 on the next trip as the Chargers trimmed the deficit to one at 52-51 with 50 seconds to play.

SUNY Cobleskill bled the shot clock down and though King missed his jumper with 19 seconds to play, he grabbed the rebound and was fouled by Mirza. Two made free throws gave the Fighting Tigers a 54-51 lead with 16 seconds to play. Mirza was fouled on Lancaster Bible's next possession and hit two free throws with 10 seconds to play to once again cut the Chargers' deficit to one at 54-53. 

Nunez was fouled with seven seconds to play, but missed the front end of the 1-and-1 and the rebound was pulled down by Leonard. The Chargers went up the floor and called timeout with five seconds to play. Out of the timeout, Mirza found Suniga under the basket who laid the ball in with 0.7 seconds to play. SUNY Cobleskill did not get a shot off and the Chargers had their 20th win of the year.

"What a crazy game," Tague said. "Just the nature of the style of the two teams, there were so few possessions and depending on how your possession went, it was either really good or really bad. There were a few times we were down by four and it was really tenuous because I didn't think we could go down six and have enough time to come back."

Tague said both teams missed chances to put the other away, but specifically the Chargers early in the second half.

"I didn't think we took advantage of some of the opporunities we had early in the second half," Tague said. "If we hit a few more buckets there, I thought we could have made it really tough on them to come back, but give them credit, they beared down and got themselves back into the game."

Tague said he was proud of the way his team responded and how they fought the whole way until the end. 

"The guys grinded and battled and didn't get down on themselves," Tague said. "I thought we were aggressive at the end of the game and it is really important to the guys that they play at home in the playoffs."

Mirza and Dunston finished with 13 points, while Suniga and Perry added 12 points each. Mirza also had seven assists and three steals.

Lancaster Bible will play three games during the final week of the regular season beginning with its final road game of the regular season on Tuesday at Penn College. The Chargers will then host Gallaudet next Friday night and wrap-up the regular season next Saturday against Wilson. Depending on the outcome of Gallaudet's game at Wilson on Monday night, the Chargers could clinch the top spot in the conference on Tuesday.

"There is still a lot of work to do," Tague said. "All three games are big next week and the guys know that."

Tuesday's game in Williamsport is set to tip-off at 7 p.m.

Notes:
-Lancaster Bible is now 5-0 all-time against SUNY Cobleskill.

-Suniga's 12 points give him 1,252 points for his career and he is now in 13th place on the all-time Lancaster Bible scoring list.