#bryson johnson

BUCKNELL

LAST SEASON : 25-9 (.735) CONFERENCE RECORD: 13-1 (1st) STARTERS LOST/RETURNING: 1/4 RPI: 82 2010-11 FINISH: Won Patriot League tournament COACH : Dave Paulsen (Williams '87) RECORD AT SCHOOL : 46-49 (3 years) CAREER RECORD: 46-49 (3 years)

AUDIO: Bucknell coach Dave Paulsen talks about the upcoming season with Hoop Time's Chris Courogen

STRENGTHS

Coming off of a 25-9 season in which the Bison pretty much cruised to the league title, Bucknell returns four starters, including the league's top defender, the league's top three-point shooter and a stretch-the floor four man who might just be the league's top glue guy.

You can argue all day and well into the night about the relative merits of Bucknell's talented junior Big Man, Mike Muscala and Lehigh scoring machine C.J. McCollum.

There is no argument, though, about the relative merits of the supporting casts that surround the league's last two players of the year. Muscala, last year's POY, is surrounded by two-time PL Defensive Player of the Year, Bryan Cohen; the league's best three-point shooter, Bryson Johnson; and rugged four-man Joe Willman, arguably the best returning true power forward in the league.

Muscala, who led the Bison in scoring last year, ranked seventh in the league in scoring and was in the top five in rebounding, field goal percentage, free throw percentage and blocked shots.

It wasn't as if Muscala's showing was a complete surprise. He was a second team All-Patriot League pick as a freshman. But most of his offense as a freshman came on jump shots. Conventional wisdom heading into last season was the skinny 6-11 beanpole needed to put on a few more pounds of muscle before becoming the dominating force in the low post he turned out to be as a sophomore.

If Muscala's showing last season wasn't scary enough for coaches around the league, Bucknell coach Dave Paulsen says he expects Muscala to be even better this time around.v “Mike is continuing to get stronger. He has added a few more counter moves in the post and is driving the ball more,” says Paulsen. “We want him to lead the league in rebounding, too. We want him to become a dominant rebounder.”

If Muscala were Bucknell's only weapon, opposing coaches wouldn't be so worried. But Paulsen has surrounded his big man with a squad of snipers who are poised to exploit the openings created when defenses try to take away Muscala inside.

Led by Johnson, a 6-1 junior from Nova Scotia, Canada, Bucknell was the second-best shooting team in the league overall and topped the Patriot League in three-point shooting percentage.

Johnson followed his 67 three-pointer freshman season by knocking down a school-record 99 treys last season, earning second team All-Patriot honors.

Paulsen wouldn't mind if Johnson improved his defense and his ball handling, two areas every scouting report in the league will tell you are weaknesses. At the end of the day, though, the coach will be happy if Johnson just improves on his league-leading (and seventh in the nation) 45.6 percent shooting from the arc.

“It's not an outlandish stretch to say Bryson could become the best shooter in the country,” Paulsen says.

Johnson was one of six Bison to shoot better than 35 percent from three point range last season. Four of those six return, including 6-5 senior Cohen.

Cohen is best known around the league as the lockdown defender who held Lehigh's McCollum, the league's top scorer, to a combined 17 for 50 shooting from the field in Bucknell's three wins over the Mountain Hawks last season. Cohen did similarly effective jobs on most of the league's other top scorers last season. But his game at the offensive end is not half bad, either.

As a freshman Cohen averaged nearly 12 points per game, and though his points production has dropped the last two seasons as his role has changed, Cohen is still a capable scorer. He reached double figures 10 times last season, including a season-high 19 points against LaSalle.

Cohen didn't take enough three-pointers to be included on the league's leader board. If had, though, his 44.1 percent (26 of 59) accuracy would have ranked second in the league, behind only Johnson. Ditto his 1.15 assists to turnovers ratio, which would have been in the top 10 in the Patriot.

“BC is so versatile. He can guard any position on the floor. He was as effective on (6-9 American University power forward) Vlad Moldoveanu (the league's number two scorer) as he was against (6-3) C.J. McCollum (the league's top scorer),” says Paulsen. “BC also does a lot of the little things – getting to loose balls, tips, key rebounds. If they kept stats on winning plays, he would lead the league.”

Then there is Willman, the 6-7 junior who Paulsen says would be the star on many other teams in the league.

“Joe is a terrific player. On any other team people would be talking about Joe Willman,” says Paulsen. “Sometimes he is the forgotten man.”

Teams that forget about Willman when concentrating in stopping Muscala usually take steps in an effort to correct that mistake once Willman has two or thee touches on the offensive end. His 46.6 percent field goal shooting ranked ninth in the league last season.

“When he shoots that mid-range jumper, I always think it is going in,” Paulsen says.

Paulsen is hoping Willman develops his low post game this season to allow him to take advantage of mismatches he will have in the Patriot League, where a lot of teams are forced to play guys better suited to small forward at the power forward spot.

With four returning starters who each have all-league potential, Bucknell obviously has the potential to be very, very good again this season.

WEAKNESSES

The question is: Who will distribute the ball?

Last year the young Bison had the benefit of playing with the league's top point guard, senior Darryl Shazier, who was second in the nation in assist-to-turnover ratio.

With Shazier graduated, Cameron Ayers is the most likely candidate for the job.

The son of former NBA and Ohio State head coach Randy Ayers, the 6-5 sophomore was a key contributor as a freshman, coming off the bench to backup at the point and on the wings.

Ayers reached double figures 10 times en route to being named to the Patriot's All-Rookie team. His 38 points and 13 rebounds in three league postseason games earned him a spot on the All-Tournament team.

Paulsen has two other young point guards who will compete for the job, but heading into the season, Ayers is the favorite.

Some will argue Ayers is not a natural point and would be more at home on the wing. Paulsen disagrees.

“The thing about Cam is, you can play him anywhere and he functions pretty well. He is as smart and as poised as any young player I've been around,” says Pauslen.

That said, Bucknell's offense will look different with Ayers running the show. Ayers is not as fast as Shazier, not as likely to just blow by people with the ball. Where Shazier oft gave up the ball leading to a shot, Paulsen says Ayers will be more likely to give it up, run off some screens and get it back for a shot.

At 6-5, Ayers is also very big for a point guard, especially in the Patriot League. Don't be surprised if the Bison look for him to post up smaller defenders.

The other two candidates for the job are more traditional point guard types. Sophomore Ryan Hill (0.8 ppg, 0.7 rpg) saw action in 32 games as a freshman. Hill, 6-3, is an intuitive passer with good floor vision and feel for the game. He will need to tighten up his game and shoot the ball a little better (3-for-19 from the field last year) if he expects to cut into Ayers' minutes.

Paulsen says 6-2 freshman Steve Kaspar will also be in the mix. Kaspar is a good passer who also can score. How much he plays, and how soon, depends on how quickly he adjusts to college ball.

“If I were a betting man, I'd guess Steve will factor into our rotation pretty quickly,” Paulsen says. “He is likely to see a significant amount of playing time.”

The development of Hill and/or Kaspar could be a key since it would allow Paulsen to use Ayers in the sixth man role he filled last season. That might well make the Bison a better team.

Ayers is capable of providing an offensive spark off the bench and he's the heir apparent to Cohen as the team's lockdown defender. His versatility can be used a lot more if he is not stuck at the point.

OPPORTUNITIES

If Ayers stays at the point, there will be minutes off the bench for another wing.

Sophomore Ben Brackney is a good shooter whose minutes increased late last season. The 6-4 Brackney should get minutes backing up Johnson and Cohen, but he will have to improve defensively if he wants to be on the floor when games are on the line.

Paulsen is also expecting 6-3 freshman Joshea Singleton to find his way into the rotation on the wing.

“Joshea is a terrific athlete, probably the best athlete on our team,” says Paulsen. “I'd be surprised if he didn't see the court quite a bit.”

There are also minutes to be had in the frontcourt rotation.

Last year G.W. Boon played both the three and the four off the bench. He has graduated, leaving a 20-minute hole in the rotation.

There is nobody capable of filling the same dual role as Boon did last season, so those minutes will probably be split. Some will go to one of the wings we just mentioned and some will go to more conventional big man type guys.

Senior Enoch Andoh, who languished in Paulsen's doghouse for much of his first two-and-a-half seasons, worked his way up the depth chart last season and became the first frontcourt option off the bench by the time the second half of league play rolled around.

Given the opportunity, the 6-8 Andoh established himself as one of the top low post threats in the Patriot. If he returns in better physical condition, Andoh could see a big increase in his playing time as a senior.

There is no doubt Andoh is an offensive presence. If he proves to Paulsen he can play with high intensity on a consistent basis, he is going to get minutes, maybe even in tandem with Muscala, whose skill set allows him to play both facing and back to the basket.

Colin Klebon (1.8 ppg, 1.3 rpg) is a 6-8 junior whose season was a mirror image of Andoh's last year. Klebon lost minutes as Andoh's practice performance moved him ahead of Klebon on the depth chart. Like Andoh, Klebon needs to improve his conditioning if he wants to gain minutes.

Both Andoh and Klebon are centers, lacking the mobility to guard most four men.

That means Penn transfer Brian Fitzpatrick and 6-7 freshman Corey Starkey could find minutes backing Willman.

Fitzpatrick is a 6-8 forward who has the physical tools to contribute if he becomes more consistent, Paulsen says.

Starkey, the son of a high school coach, is big and strong enough to be physically ready to defend and rebound at the college level.

THREATS

After last season's success, a lot of folks began making comparisons to Bucknell's back-to-back league championship teams from a few years back.

It's understandable why; both teams won their first title with a lineup full of underclassmen.

There are big differences between the two, though. These Bison have a different coach and a very different style of play.

The giant killers from 2006 and 2007 didn't shoot the ball as well as this bunch. But the matchup zone those teams played confounded the opposition, enabling them to knock off nationally ranked power schools such as Pittsburgh, Syracuse and Kansas.

This team is also outstanding defensively. But Paulsen has relied almost exclusively on straight man-to-man defense. That was enough to lead the Patriot League in defense, but the jury remains out on whether these Bison can match up mano a mano with Top 25 athletes in out of conference and NCAA Tournament play.

Paulsen seems convinced they can. His team will get a chance to prove it early. The Bison's non-conference schedule opens on the road at Minnesota and Vanderbilt and includes eight teams that made the postseason a year ago.

The other big difference between the prior editions and this team is at the point. Those 06-07 teams had a veteran returning starter at the point.

Bucknell's non-conference slate won't be easy with a point guard receiving on the job training.

One of those point guard candidates will have to establish himself as a top-flight playmaker for the Bison to repeat.

BISON CHIPS: Last year's 25 wins were second-most in a season ever at Bucknell . . . Not mentioned in strengths above – Sojka Psychos, the BU students who are easily top student section in the Patriot League … Psychos are part of why Bucknell was 14-1 at home last season, 7-0 in league games . . . Since opening in 2003, Bison are 84-29 in the pavilion . . . 61-11 in Sojka against PL teams . . . Bucknell easily has toughest non-conference schedule of all PL teams this season, with seven opponents who went to the NCAA Tournament last year . . . All seven were 20-game winners . . . Not included in that list is Big Ten's Minnesota, where Bucknell opens the season.

BUCKNELL-MINNESOTA GAME NOTES | BUCKNELL ROSTER | BUCKNELL SCHEDULE | BUCKNELL STATS (2010-11)

PREVIOUS PREVIEWS

American University

Army

Colgate

Holy Cross

Lafayette

Lehigh

By CHRIS A. COUROGEN Hoop Time Editor

You might call this one a technical knockout.

After pummeling Lehigh with a series of short Mike Muscala jabs and some combination haymakers by Bryson Johnson and G.W. Boon, Bucknell had the Mountain Hawks on the ropes almost from the start of last night's 81-68 road win in Bethlehem.

It was what has become a typical start for the Bison (15-7 overall, 6-0 Patriot League), who have made it a habit to jump on teams early. For the fourth time in six league wins, Bucknell established a double digit lead before the intermission, leading by as many as 17 before taking a 12-point lead to the locker room at the break.

And when Lehigh coach Dr. Brett Reed jumped into the center of the ring three minutes into the second half and promptly got himself ejected, it was over.

Unlike boxing, the refs didn't actually stop the bout. But after Muscala hit the four free throws awarded on Reed's double technical foul, and Daryl Shazier sliced through the Mountain Hawks defense for a layup on the ensuing possession, giving the Bison a 25-point lead, every one of the announced crowd of 555 that braved near-blizzard conditions to get to Stabler Arena knew it was over.

After the game, Reed admitted he had tried to draw a technical when he went all the way out to the center circle of the court arguing a no-call after freshman guard Mackey McKnight hit the floor after missing on a three from right in front of the Lehigh bench.

Bucknell's Joe Willman, who eventually fouled out anyhow, may or may not have made contact with McKnight. From a vantage point on the other side and far end of the court and without benefit of a replay, it looked as if any contact, which came well after the shot, was incidental. No doubt there was also an element of fine acting on McKnight's part as well.

The officials seemed to view it the same way from their vantage point, though the way they called the game, that is hardly a ringing endorsement (more on that later).

It really didn't matter. After his team managed to rope-a-dope its way to halftime somehow still in the game, down just a dozen points – 37-25 – despite shooting only 27.6 percent from the field, Reed was looking for the Mountain Hawks (11-10, 2-4) to open the second half with a burst of energy and passion.

Instead they came out and let Bucknell quickly extend its lead to 19.

At that point, Reed was just looking for an excuse to get a T in hopes it would fire up his moribund squad, which at that point would have gotten a standing eight count had it actually been a boxing match.

“Our team was not playing with a type of passion and energy that we needed,” said Reed. “I was going to interject myself into the game to see if I could stimulate that passion and energy. I extended myself on to the floor deeply knowing I'd get the technical.”

The second T, the one that left Reed to watch the rest of the game on a television monitor in the locker room, was not intentional. It really did not seem deserved, either. It was not as if Reed was berating the refs when he went on the floor. He didn't seem to even say a word after the first technical.

It didn't matter. Before Reed could retreat to the Lehigh bench, official Andrew Marotta made that big sweeping hook motion with his arm and Reed's night was done.

“I was most certainly deserving (of the first technical),” Reed said. “My intention was not to continue to harass or berate an official. The technicals came in immediate succession.”

The six points Bucknell scored on the free throws and the ensuing possession pretty much ended any suspense about the outcome, but it would be wrong to blame Reed's technicals for the loss. Lehigh was already in desperate straits when Reed resorted to that desperate measure.

As Reed put it: “If we had continued on the same trajectory we were on, we weren't going to necessarily get the proper result anyway.”

Not with Bucknell's balanced attack that resulted in five different Bison scoring in double figures. And certainly not with Lehigh star C.J. McCollum being hounded into one of the toughest offensive nights of his young career.

On paper, it shows McCollum finished with 24 points, almost three better than his average. But look beyond the box score and you'll see 18 of those came after Reed had left the building when the outcome really was not in doubt.

Even then it took a lot of assistance from a whistle-crazed trio of officials who called a combined total of 53 personal fouls in their efforts to impress the NCAA's officials observer, who was on hand to scout talent for March's Big Dance.

Hounded by Patriot League Defensive Player of the Year Cohen, and freshman guard Cameron Ayers, who drew the assignment when Cohen was not on the floor, McCollum managed just 2 field goals on 11 first half shots and finished the night 5 for 17 from the field, 0 for 3 from the three-point arc. The rest of his points came at the foul line, where he was a perfect 14-for-14.

“He was well-defended on an individual basis, but he was better defended by a team structure or system. When he did have opportunities to penetrate or create, there was always a second defender right there,” said Reed. “And if he had an opportunity to get close to the rim, the second and sometimes third defender came with long arms and shot-blocking ability.”

McCollum had four shots rejected, including three by Muscala, who tied a Bucknell school record with 8 blocks despite playing in foul trouble much of the second half.

Muscala was an equal opportunity defender, spreading the rejection around. His other five blocks came on shots by five different players. For good measure Muscala also scored 15 points, grabbed 9 rebounds, dished off 2 assists and came up with a pair of steals, all while not turning the ball over once.

He was not the only Bison to put up impressive numbers. Sophomore guard Bryson Johnson hit four threes and finished with a team-high 18 points. Forward Joe Willman, who played just 17 minutes before fouling out, scored 10 points while he was on the floor and his backup, senior G.W. Boon, who ended the night with 4 personals, added 11 points and yanked down 5 boards in his 17 minutes of action.

Shazier also finished in double figures for Bucknell with 12 points while dishing off 7 assists. The senior point guard, who leads the league in assists and ranks third in the nation in assists to turnover ratio, did have an uncharacteristic three turnovers, tying his season high.

That hardly mattered. Nor did the 31 fouls called on the Bison, the most they have been whistled for since a November 2008 overtime loss at St. Francis (Pa.). Lehigh made 32 of the 40 free throws they were awarded, but that did little to offset the Mountain Hawks 18 for 59 showing from the field. Especially not when Bucknell made 30 free throws of its own, going 88.2 percent from the line (30-of-34) and made seven threes while Lehigh was 0-for-13 from the arc.

The win, Bucknell's first in Stabler Arena in the Dave Paulsen era, snapped a three-game Bison losing streak in Lehigh's cavernous concrete barn and gave Bucknell more wins already this season than it had all of last year.

More importantly, combined with American's loss at Navy, the win gives Bucknell a two-game lead on the rest of the league with Saturday's visit to Army still to play in the first go around of the conference.

The Bison have now won nine straight and 13 of their last 14 after a 2-6 start.

With the loss, Lehigh drops a game behind its archrival Lafayette in the battle for fourth place and a first-round home game in the Patriot League Tournament. The Mountain Hawks, which host Holy Cross on Saturday, are tied with Army and Navy for fifth in the league. That could become a four-way tie for last if Colgate manages to pull off an upset over Holy Cross in tonight's meeting in Worcester.