MILLIGAN COLLEGE, Tenn. (Feb. 3, 2016) â€" After James Songster, Will Buckner and Kurt Brooks, who reached 1,000 career points with a pair of free throws at the 5:10 mark of the first half, led a 10-0 Buffaloes run between the end of the first half and beginning of the second, Julian Bailey converted on five huge points down the stretch to propel the Milligan College men's basketball team to a 63-57 win over Bluefield College Wednesday night at the Steve Lacy Fieldhouse.
 
The win raised Milligan's record to 13-7 overall and 9-5 in the Appalachian Athletic Conference as the Buffs won for the third time in their last four games. Bluefield fell to 13-10 (5-8 AAC) and snapped their three-game win streak. The Rams had previously fallen to three of the top four teams in the AAC before their win streak, which made Wednesday the fourth loss for Bluefield against the top four teams in the league, all by less than 11 points.
 
Brooks led both teams with a game-high 16 points, and now has 1,011 career points after beginning the night five away from the millennial mark. Bailey was next with 16 points and nine rebounds, finishing one board shy of the 14th double-double of his senior campaign, while Brooks also had four assists and eight boards, two shy of the fourth double-double of his season. Like Bailey, Songster finished with nine rebounds, and also had nine points without a miss from the field (3-3) and three assists, while Buckner contributed with 10 points.

Milligan's run to end the first half and begin the second started with a three by David Casaday on the assist from Songster moments before the halftime buzzer sounded. The shot cut a six-point Rams lead in half at 31-28, and led to the Buffs coming out firing to start the final 20 minutes.

Brooks started the second half with a three off another assist from Songster, who two minutes later, hit a three of his own off the assist from Milos Petrovic, then connected on a free throw to give Milligan a 35-31 edge less than three minutes into the final period.

After the Rams retook the lead, Buckner came up big with his second dunk of the game to tie it, leading to a fastbreak bucket from Songster and another three by Brooks with the assist again going to Songster. That surge was followed by another score from Buckner and ended with an and-one by Songster to give Milligan an eight-point lead at 49-41.

Next, Brooks and Bailey continued to pace the Buffs as another Brooks three, which was Milligan's fifth of the half after going 0-for-7 in the first, followed by a basket from Buckner thanks to a Brooks assist gave Milligan its largest lead of the game, a 10-point margin at 54-44 with 10:55 left to play.

That was, however, the last bucket Milligan would score over the next seven minutes as the Buffs only make one basket the rest of the way and were held to only nine points over the last 10-plus minutes.

Milligan was able to use 6-of-8 shooting from the charity stripe, the first three of which came from Bailey, over the last six minutes of the game to hold on for the win. Bluefield managed to get within one possession at 55-52 before Bailey made a layup with 3:52 to go, ending an 8-1 Rams' run that featured them shooting 5-8 from the free throw line with one 3-pointer.

Despite committing 21 turnovers in the game compared to only eight by Bluefield, Milligan was able to withstand its dry spell in the latter 10 minutes of the game thanks to being over 43 percent shooting from the field at the 3:30 mark with Bluefield under 27 percent at the same point.

The Rams, who went 5-11 from the line during the final 8:36 of the game, were led by 14 points and 11 rebounds from Cordaris Towns, 13 points from Joseph McClain, and 10 boards from Alonzo Howard.

Next up, the Buffs will play two top-15 nationally ranked teams in three days, beginning with No. 5 Union College on the road in Barbourville, Kentucky, on Saturday, Feb. 6, at 6 p.m., and ending on Monday, Feb. 8, at 7:30 p.m. against No. 15 Tennessee Wesleyan College at the Steve Lacy Fieldhouse. Milligan will then have two more home games to finish off the week on Wednesday, Feb. 10, against Johnson University 7 p.m., and on Saturday, Feb. 13, against Point University at 4 p.m.