The Buena Vista men's basketball team overcame a 14-point second half deficit on Saturday afternoon and forced overtime, but the rally came up short there, as Wartburg College hung on for an 83-80 victory inside of Siebens Fieldhouse.

Nick Clark led all scorers with 27 points, including four treys, while also dishing out 11 assists for his third double-double of the year.  Kennedy Drey added 20 points and seven rebounds, while Thomas Wisecup came up big down the stretch and finished with 14 points on 5-of-10 shooting.

For the second straight game, the Beavers struggled with the long range shot, going just 6-of-32 (18 percent).  The team was held under 40 percent overall for the second straight game, but did sink 20-of-22 attempts at the free-throw line.

Defensively, BUV outrebounded the Knights 46-39, but were outscored 22-10 on points off turnovers.  The Beavers turned it over 19 times and the Knights 16.

Sean Morgan's layup seconds into the game put BVU in front for the only time in the contest at 2-0.  The Knights followed with an 11-2 run over the next four minutes and seemed to have an answer for each Beaver score.

It was a 10-point game at 24-14 midway through the first half before BVU stormed back with an 18-8 run, capped off by nine straight points from Clark to tie things at 32-32 with 2:32 to go.

Wartburg closed the half by scoring six of the final eight points and took a four-point lead into the half.

The Knights then came out and scored the first 10 points of the second period to take a 14-point lead at 48-34 with 16:51 to go.

Five straight points by Wisecup cut the deficit back to single digits, and after Wartburg went back in front by 10 at 51-41, Clark then hit another three to help spark a 9-3 run over the next four minutes to get as close as 54-50 with 11:30 to go.

Seven straight points by the Knights saw the lead go back to 11 with less than 10 minutes to go.  It was extended to 13 at the 7:09 mark and was still that same margin at 73-60 with 5:08 remaining.

Wartburg tried to slow the pace down and run off some clock, but the defense tightened up by the Beavers, and they were able to claw back in.  After a missed shot attempt by the Knights, Wisecup drilled a trey to cut the deficit to 10 with less than four to go.

Back-to-back misses by Wartburg were turned into a layup by Drey and a tough three-pointer by Clark to make it a five-point game with 2:34 left, forcing Wartburg to call timeout.

A jumper by the Knights pushed the lead back to seven at 75-68, but a three-point play from Wisecup and consecutive buckets by Drey tied things up at 75-75 with just 24 ticks to play.

Wartburg ran the clock down on its next possession, but was off target with its shot attempt that was grabbed Kyler Huisman, who quickly called timeout.  Drey nearly won it for BVU on the inbounds play, as his three-quarter shot was online, but bounced off the back part of the rim to send the game into overtime.

Huisman gave BVU its first lead (78-77) since the opening seconds of the game when he sank 1-of-2 free-throw attempts with 3:06 remaining.  Drey later put the Beavers up 80-78 with a layup, but the Knights quickly came back down the floor and no one stopped the ball which led to a layup and a tie game.

BVU then missed its final three field goal attempts, but remained in the game as Wartburg made just one of its final four free-throw attempts.  Drey had a chance to forced double overtime, but his shot fired off the front of the rim.

Nick Webber led Wartburg (9-6, 2-2 IIAC) with 22 points as Jordan Cannon followed with 18.

Buena Vista is 7-8 on the year (2-2 IIAC) and will be on the road this upcoming Wednesday night for a pivotal match-up with league favorite Dubuque (10-5, 3-1 IIAC) beginning at 8:00pm.