ST. BONIFACIOUS, Minn. – In a battle of two UMAC unbeaten's, the Bethany Lutheran men's basketball team took a narrow 75-71 win over Crown in what proved to be a back and forth affair. With the win the Vikings move to 13-3 overall and 5-0 in the UMAC while the Polars fall to 11-4 and 4-1 in the conference.

From the opening tip of this one the two teams found themselves in a dogfight with neither finding much offensive flow early and playing to an 8-8 score through the first five minutes. Crown would find their first run of the game over the next five minutes as they would outscore the Vikings 16-4 during to hold a 24-12 lead midway through the half. They would push their lead to the biggest by either team in the contest at 15 points with 8:41 remaining in the half before Bethany finally starting to find its rhythm.

The Vikings would score 12 unanswered points, with Drew Sagedahl and Xavier Patterson each scoring five in the stretch to trim the deficit to three. Crown would end their scoring drought late in the half but visitors continued to press their advantage and eventually overtook the Polars, with a Mason Ackley dunk with time winding down giving Bethany a 37-33 lead at the break.

Crown would open up the second half strong as they were able to use an 11-3 run to take a 44-40 lead with 16 minutes to go. The two teams would then go punch for punch over the next few minutes before the Vikings were slowly able to build an eight-point lead with 6:46 to go.

A Dominik Bangu three with four minutes left would put the Vikings up by 10 before the Polars started to push their way back into the game. They would score 10 of the next 12 points to cut the deficit to 68-66 with just over a minute to go before Patterson would knock down a huge three pointer to put Bethany up by five. Crown would answer with another basket inside before Hunter Nielsen was able to finish off a great pass from Jax Madson to put Bethany back up five with 37 seconds to play.

After being fouled the Vikings would miss their ensuing free throw, but they would get a huge stop defensively on the other end with a Polar three pointer coming up short and giving Bethany the ball under the hoop with two seconds to go. Patterson would get fouled on the inbounds pass and step to the line and knock down both shots to seal the win.

Nielsen led the way with 20 points for the Vikings while Patterson added 16. Madson nearly tallied a double-double as he posted 12 points and nine rebounds, while Sagedahl added 11 points off the bench.

Bethany will be back in action next Friday when they travel to UW-Superior for a 7:30 p.m. contest.