The Bison had a chance to stop No. 24 Lehigh from winning the Patriot League title on Nov. 5, but fell just short to the Mountain Hawks with a final score of 20-13 at Goodman Stadium. R.J. Nitti ’17, Will Carter ’17, and Joey DeFloria ’18 all kept pressure offensively while Mark Pyles ’18 and Abdullah Anderson ’18 were all over the field, contributing defensively.

Nitti was 17 for 26 with 228 yards total in the game. The completion of his first nine passes helped bring the football team to the six-point halftime advantage. Nitti went over 400 pass completions to reach 410 in his career, and also became the third Bison player to throw for more than 5,000 yards in a career. Carter had four catches for 120 yards for his eighth career 100-yard outing. DeFloria had 28 carries for 119 yards and a touchdown, making that his fifth 100-yard game this season.

Although the Bison put up a tough fight, they committed two turnovers, which were very costly. The first one led to a field goal by Lehigh, and the second prevented them from potentially having a game-tying touchdown.

“We turned the ball over twice in critical situations. Against a good football team like this it is difficult to make mistakes like that,” head coach Joe Susan said.

Despite the turnovers, Pyles and Anderson stayed strong in defense. Pyles led the Bison with seven tackles, and Anderson had three tackles, two of which were sacks, and a pair of pass breakups.

The Bison finished with a 382-357 edge in total offense yards, which was the highest figure for the Bison since they totaled 403 against VMI on Sept. 24.

“Our seniors have two games left. We will work to fix what we have to fix,” Susan said.

The Bison will play their final away game of the season Nov. 12 at 3:30 p.m. when they travel to Georgetown to compete against the Hoyas.