John Carroll men's basketball earned an important victory in pursuit of the Ohio Athletic Conference regular season championship.

The Blue Streaks got out to an early lead and sealed the deal late, defeating Ohio Northern University, 90-82, at the Tony DeCarlo Varsity Center on Saturday.

JCU improves to 16-6 on the year, and moves to 13-3 in the OAC. The Blue Streaks are now one game behind frontrunning Marietta with two contests to play. The Blue and Gold have won 13 of their last 14.

David Linane Jr., led all scorers with 25. Simon Kucharewicz added 18 and 11 rebounds for a double-double. The Polar Bears had five different players score in double figures.

John Carroll opened the game on a 9-0 run. The run was highlighted by Kucharewicz, who connected on two layups.Ohio Northern would answer back quickly as they scored 10 unanswered points, Konnor Baker buried two three-pointers giving the Polar Bears a 10-9 lead with 15:58 left in the first half.

Kucharewicz found a cutting Linane to open up a 14-2 run in favor of JCU. Ohio Northern would have to use a timeout as John Carroll led 26-14.

Later, Noah Bidar got inside the paint and found John Cirillo, giving the Blue and Gold a 36-23 lead with 6:08 left in the first half.

Linane caught fire nearing the end of the first half, connecting on three consecutive three-pointers. JCU went into the locker room with a 51-35 lead. Linane led all scorers with 15, Kucharewicz and Doug Caputo each added 10. Joey DiOrio led the Polar Bears with nine.

The Blue Streaks defense held Ohio Northern to shoot 38 percent from the field, while forcing eight turnovers. Linane got a defensive rebound and went coast-to-coast finishing the play with an and-one, giving JCU a 58-38 lead with 17:51 left in the contest.

Devon Allen made his second three-pointer of the game cutting the JCU lead to 12. However, on the following possession the home crowd erupted after Kucharewicz threw down a big dunk giving the Blue Streaks a 62-48 lead with under 12 minutes left in the game.

After taking a timeout, Ohio Northern put together six unanswered points in under one minute. Ryan Berger would connect on a layup to end the run, making the score 80-68 with 4:05 left in the game.

John Carroll will travel to Tiffin, Ohio to take on Heidelberg University on Wednesday at 7 p.m.