After a winless road trip to Miami and Fordham over the past week, the Binghamton men’s basketball team got back in the win column Saturday afternoon with a commanding 77-48 victory over Misericordia. While the Bearcats got off to a cold start, key adjustments and a big second half cemented the victory.

“We’re really excited, obviously, to get the win,” said Binghamton associate head coach Brian Johnson, who filled in for head coach Levell Sanders on Saturday. “With our head coach not being here, we’re keeping him in our thoughts and prayers first and foremost. But definitely excited to come out here and play in front of our fans after being on the road this past week.”

Binghamton (2-3) stumbled out of the gate early against the visiting Cougars (2-1), as miscues and turnovers opened the door for Misericordia to quickly build a 4-0 lead. While the Bearcats responded as senior forward Nehemiah Benson drove in a layup for their first points of the day, the Cougars swiftly made a three-pointer and drew a foul afterward to make it 8-2, forcing a BU timeout.

“We had quite a few turnovers in the first four minutes, and it didn’t allow us to get some shots to the basket,” Johnson said. “So for us, calling that time out really kind of just settled us down and to also tell each other, ‘Hey, let’s have some fun. Let’s believe in each other as well, but let’s not just throw the ball away and give them easy baskets.’”

Coming out of the timeout, Johnson put redshirt junior guard Chris Walker and graduate student forward Ben Callahan-Gold into the game to help reignite the Bearcat offense. This change resulted in an 11-0 run, spearheaded by Walker, who drained back-to-back three-pointers with graduate student guard Tymu Chenery to tie the game at eight. Callahan-Gold then scored a layup before Walker knocked down another three-pointer of his own to make it 13-8. While Misericordia built a six-point unanswered run to cut the lead to 20-16, Chenery slammed it down at the rim to kill the Cougars’ momentum and make it 22-16. Binghamton built the lead out to double-digits from there, with a contested three-pointer from Callahan-Gold as time expired, giving the hosts the game’s largest lead thus far at 40-25 going into halftime.

“It was just [Walker’s] opportunity to [ball handle] today,” Johnson said. “I thought he did a really tremendous job kind of setting us up, not taking any wild shots but also getting other guys shots. It was exciting to kind of know that we also have another dominant ball handler if we need to put somebody else in for [sophomore guard Jayden Lemond].”

Looking to widen the gap in the second period, Chenery quickly got to work by cleaning up a board and punching in a layup to make it 42-25. The scoreboard soon read 50-33 after sophomore forward Gavin Walsh grabbed a rebound and took the rock coast-to-coast with a spin move being the cherry on top of an easy layup. The Bearcats continued to dominate from there, with one sequence seeing senior guard Wes Peterson Jr. and Benson ping-pong the ball downcourt for a Peterson slam dunk to make it 66-40. As the clock ticked down, the dagger came from senior guard Robby Phillips, who swished in a layup for the game’s final points to secure a 77-48 Binghamton victory.

Leading the way for Binghamton with 19 points off the back of 4-for-8 shooting from beyond the arc was Callahan-Gold. Walker and Chenery also shot 50 percent from the three-point line with 14 and 12 points, respectively. Meanwhile, Walsh kept his double-double streak going with 11 points and 11 boards on the day.

“It’s easy when I’m playing with a bunch of guys who are looking to get me the ball and set me up,” Callahan-Gold said. “It’s awesome to be with a group that plays this way. It’s fun to be around.”

The Bearcats will remain at home to begin next week’s slate of action, as the squad is set to take on Longwood on Tuesday, Nov. 19. Tipoff is set for 6:07 p.m. on the Dr. Bai Lee Court at the Events Center in Vestal, New York.