EWING, N.J. – The College of New Jersey men's basketball team pulled out an exciting 98-88 win over Montclair State on Saturday. TCNJ bumped up its record to 12-8 on the year including 9-4 in New Jersey Athletic Conference action. Montclair State fell to 9-11 and 7-6 in the conference.

The first half was a closely contested battle, and neither team was able to build a big lead. With three minutes to play the Red Hawks went up 46-38, but the Lions closed out the half with a 9-0 stretch to take a 47-46 edge.

Randall Walko hit a pair of free throws to get the run going. On the next trip down the floor, Ryan Jensen made a pair from the charity stripe to make it a 46-42 game. Walko scored on a strong take to the bucket, then with eight seconds left struck from three point range to give TCNJ the lead heading into the locker room.

In the second half, the Lions took a 60-53 lead when Walko hit a bucket four minutes in. P.J. Ringel made a lay-up to put the Lions ahead 65-56. A couple of minutes later, Travis Jocelyn threw down a thunderous dunk to give the TCNJ a 69-59 edge.

Jocelyn scored on a lay-up with 6:51 to play to put the Lions ahead 78-67. The Red Hawks had an answer, but the Lions went down the floor quickly after that. Mike Walley scored from in close to give TCNJ an 80-69 lead.

Montclair State recorded a bucket to cut TCNJ's lead to five with just 2:36 remaining. Walley scored on another lay-in to bump the lead back up to seven. With 1:35 to go a personal foul was called on the Red Hawks, as well as a technical. TCNJ hit all four free throws to take a commanding 90-77 lead, and the Lions did not look back after that.

Walko set a new career-high with 38 points. He shot 10-of-18 from the field, 3-of-7 from three-point range, and a perfect 15-of-15 from the free throw line. The 38 points gave Walko 1,336 for his career, which put him in the top 10 in TCNJ program history. Walko is now ninth all-time in scoring. He also passed Greg Grant and Eric Klacik on the all-time TCNJ three-pointer list. Walko now has 174 trifectas on his career which is good for third place in program history.

Jocelyn scored 15 points on an efficient 6-of-8 shooting. He also added six rebounds. Jensen scored 15 points and grabbed seven boards, while Walley tallied 12 points.

TCNJ shot an impressive 35-of-40 (87.5%) from the free-throw line.

The Lions will return to the court on Feb. 5 for a road trip to Rutgers-Camden.