Men's Basketball drops hard-fought 90-86 decision at No. 25 Marietta

By Caleb Scott

MARIETTA — The Ohio Northern men's basketball team battled a power outage and the Marietta men's basketball team on Saturday afternoon as it dropped a hard-fought 90-86 decision at Ban Johnson Arena.

The Polar Bears fall to 9-4 overall and 4-2 in the Ohio Athletic Conference, while the Pioneers improve to 10-3, 4-2.

Junior Ryan Bruns (Chickasaw/Marion Local) scored a game-high 32 points to lead the way offensively, while senior Nate Burger (Dayton/Alter) scored 25 points and senior Joey DiOrio (Columbus/Watterson) added an 18-point effort.

DiOrio pulled down a game-best nine rebounds while Burger dished out a game-best nine assists.

With Northern holding a 28-20 advantage with 7:23 remaining in the first half, Ban Johnson Arena suffered a power outage that suspended play for a 3-hour period. The two teams resumed play at 7 p.m. following the restoration of power to Ban Johnson Arena.

After play resumed, DiOrio drilled a 3-pointer to help ONU score six of the next eight points to push the Polar Bear lead to 34-22 with 5:50 remaining in the first half.

From there, Marietta closed the half out on a 20-4 run to grab a 42-38 lead at the intermission.

During the first seven and a half minutes of the second half, the two teams would exchange leads multiple times.

A 3-pointer from Burger with 12:33 remaining in the contest gave ONU a 57-56 lead, which would hold until 4:27 remaining in the game.

After a Bruns free throw with 5:12 left in the contest pushed the ONU lead to 75-70, the Pioneers used a 14-0 run to take an 84-75 lead with 2:28 left in the contest.

Bruns and Burger would combine for three 3-pointers in the final minute of the contest, but Northern could not catch the Pioneers as Marietta went on the claim the victory, 90-86.

The Polar Bears shot 33-of-63 (52.4 percent) from the field, including 12-of-25 (48.0 percent) from 3-point range, while the Pioneers were 34-of-64 (53.1 percent) from the field, including 10-of-18 (55.6 percent) from the three point line.

Northern edged Marietta in rebounds by a 31-30 margin.

The Polar Bears return to action on Wednesday evening as they travel to Berea to take on Baldwin Wallace at 7 pm.