STEUBENVILLE – The Franciscan men's basketball team struggled to find rythym on offense and the Barons fell to the visiting Penn State Behrend Lions 81-43, Saturday afternoon.

The Barons were able to put the pressure on early as junior Garrison Holmes forced a turnover on the very first Lion possession and took the ball straight to the hoop and laid it in for the first bucket of the game. After an unforced Lion turnover on their next possession, Holmes took advantage and put the Barons up 4-0 in the first 1:23. Andy Niland hit the first three pointer for the Loins to get them on the board and Malquan Pullium put the Lions ahead for the first time with a layup, 5-4. Junior Keoni Sablan reclaimed the lead for the Barons with a layup at 16:25 as the Barons led for the final time, 6-5.

The Lions pulled away with 10-straight points to take a 16-6 lead in the first. The Barons couldn't seem to find an answer to Behrend's outside shot and the Lions pushed their lead to 37-14 behind six three pointers from PSB. Sablan and sophomore Juwan Perkins went back-to-back with a jumper and a three on the Barons' next two possessions, but the Lions closed out the half with a 7-0 run to lead 44-19 as the teams headed into the locker room.

The Barons came out of the locker room and went on a 9-4 run behind baskets from senior Derrick David, Perkins and Sablan, to cut the lead to 48-28 4:40 into the second half. The Lions continued to rely on their hot three-point shooting and pushed their lead to 68-38 with 5:06 left in regulation. Behrend closed out the game on a 13-5 run and earned the 81-43 AMCC win.

Perkins led the Barons with 15 points and had six rebounds while adding an assist.

"Juwan had a good game for us today and continues to take steps forward," remarked head coach Joe Wallace. "Juwan and Keoni need to continue to be play makers for us and lead this offense. We need to keep getting better on offense and our defense will continue to get better."

Sablan had 10 points for Barons today and was a perfect 6-for-6 from the free throw line. Holmes had a pretty complete day for FUS with nine points and a team-best eight rebounds.

"Garrison has been sick for the last couple of days and really battled through it today and gave us some good minutes," continued Coach Wallace.

"The guys are tired, physically, mentally, just drained from a tough schedule to start this year," remarked Coach Wallace. "But we have a slogan we live by this year from Rocky. 'It's not about how hard you hit. It's about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward.' And we are going to keep moving forward."

The Barons take a quick break from AMCC action as they head to Bethany (W.Va.) on Monday for a 7pm tip.