KUTZTOWN, Pa. – The Kutztown University men's basketball team had a season-high, two-game win streak snapped as it dropped its Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference regular season opener to No. 7 Indiana University of Pennsylvania 86-73 Friday night at Keystone Arena.
 
The Golden Bears (2-4 overall, 0-1 PSAC) had three players score in double-figures, led by Moe Williams (Townsend, Del./Life Center Academy (N.J.)), who finished with a team-high 18 points and added eight rebounds and two steals in 36 minutes. Michael Smith III (Chester, Pa./Chester) tied a career-high with 15 points to go along with three rebounds and two assists. Evan-Eric Longino (Furlong, Pa./Germantown Academy) tallied 14 points and seven rebounds.
 
The Crimson Hawks (6-0, 1-0) shot 49.3% (33-of-67) from the floor and 87.5% (14-of-16) from the free-throw line, while Kutztown shot 38.5% (25-of-65) from the floor and 63.3% (19-of-30) from the charity stripe.
 
Longino scored the game's opening basket and also Kutztown's second basket, breaking a 2-2 tie, but KU trailed for a majority of the first half. Longino had 12 of his 14 points in the first half and gave KU three different leads in the opening half. IUP held a 39-34 advantage at halftime.
 
The Crimson Hawks scored the first seven points of the second half and took a double-digit lead 0:58 after intermission. Kutztown cut its deficit to as close as eight, three different times in the opening 10 minutes of the second half, but could not get any closer as IUP kept answering any run KU had.
 
Wesley Butler (Reading, Pa./Reading) finished with nine points and four rebounds. Channick Nkoma (Libreville, Gabon/Lycee National Leon M'ba) notched six points and five rebounds. Kyree Generett (York, Pa./William Penn) and Julian Boykins (Randolph, N.J./Randolph) both had four points and Akeem Taylor Jr. (Chester, Pa./Chester) recorded three points, five rebounds and two steals.
 
Kutztown looks to get back on the right track when it hosts Seton Hill University in a PSAC game tomorrow, Saturday, Dec. 4, at 7:30 p.m., at Keystone Arena.