Canisius senior Josiah Heath scored a career-high 20 points in the loss for Canisius, while also recording six rebounds, two assists and a steal in season-high 36 minutes of play. Junior Kevin Bleeker, who was making his first start since the 2011-12 season in place of the injured Jermaine Crumpton, had a season-high nine points and four rebounds for Canisius, while sophomore Zach Lewis was good for eight points and a game-high four steals. Canisius shot 47.8 percent from the field, highlighted by a 68.2 percent effort from the floor in the game's first 20 minutes, but the Blue and Gold ended the night shooting 29.4 percent from 3-point range and saw Rider turn 12 of their turnovers into 17 points.

"We knew this was going to be a battle, Rider is one of the hottest teams in the league right now, and I thought our guys fought like heck, but in the end, we just didn't make enough shots," Canisius head coach Jim Baron said. "I thought Josiah played the game of his career tonight. He battled from the tip to the final horn. We just need to make open shots. We had a bunch of open looks in the second half and we didn't convert. Give them credit, they made shots when they had to. We just need to keep working to get better. We had a shot to grab it there at the end and they did just enough to beat us."

Heath made a pair of free-throws with 58 seconds left on the clock to make the score 55-52 in favor of the Broncs. On Rider's next possession, Okerearfor pulled up and drilled a 3-pointer, one of his three makes from long-range on the night, to push Rider's margin to 58-52 with 34 seconds left to play. After Heath scored a lay-up with 18.4 seconds left on the clock, Canisius forced a Rider turnover, and Lewis was able to knife through the lane to lay one into the hoop with 11 seconds left to get Canisius within two points at 58-56. Canisius was forced to foul Okereafor, and the junior transfer from VCU hit both ends of a 1-and-1 from the charity stripe to make the score 60-56 with seven seconds to play. Canisius' Kassius Robertson knocked down a triple from the right corner with 0.8 seconds left, but Canisius was unable to steal the in-bounds pass and Rider went to the line with 0.3 seconds left. Rider's Shawn Valentine missed both free-throws, but the second miss was knocked around and the final horn sounded, giving Rider its sixth victory of the year in games decided by five points or less.

Canisius led the game 36-28 at halftime after the Blue and Gold shot 68.2 percent from the field in the first half, the team's best 20-minute shooting performance of the season. In the second half, the Griffs led 42-35 with 12:47 left in the game, but Rider raced back and took the lead at 46-42 thanks to an 11-0 run over the span of 2:31, with Okereafor knocking down two 3-pointers during the spurt. A pair of Bleeker free-throws with 7:20 left on the clock tied the game at 46-46, but Rider pulled away by scoring the game's next five points on the power of a 3-pointer from Jimmie Taylor and two made free-throws by Zedric Sadler.

Rider ended the night shooting 50 percent from the floor and 52.9 percent from 3-point range after knocking down 9-of-17 tries from behind the arc. Okereafor added eight assists and two steals to his final stat line in the win, while senior center Matt Lopez scored seven points to go with a game-high eight boards for Rider. Rider held a 24-23 advantage on the glass, while Canisius outscored the Broncs 30-20 in points in the paint.

The Griffs will return to action Sunday, Feb. 15, when the team plays host to Saint Peter's. Tipoff in the Koessler Athletic Center is set for 2 p.m.