The Niagara Purple Eagles played 34 minutes of great offense on Friday, but it was a few seconds of solid defense that gave them the win at Manhattan.

Bilal Benn stripped Rico Pickett, the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference’s leading scorer, as he rose to attempt a tying 3-pointer with nine seconds left, and the Purple Eagles pulled out a 74-72 win after leading by 15 late in the second half.

Niagara coach Joe Mihalich said the play reminded him of Benn’s game-winning stop of Rider’s Ryan Thompson in last year’s MAAC semifinals.

“The look in his eye was so cool,” Mihalich said afterwards by phone. “Bilal had this fire in his eye, and you knew (Pickett) wasn’t going to score.”

Niagara (17-13, 9-8) has now won six of its last seven games and is alone in fifth place in the MAAC standings after Rider’s home loss to Siena. The Purple Eagles will claim the No. 5 seed in next weekend’s conference tournament if they win at Fairfield on Sunday, or if Canisius wins at Rider.

Tyrone Lewis led Niagara with 21 points, five rebounds, three assists, four steals and two blocks. In the process, he became the first player in MAAC history with 1,500 points, 500 rebounds, 200 assists and 200 steals.

Lewis hit his sixth 3-pointer of the night to put Niagara up 73-58 with 6:29 left. The Purple Eagles did not make another field goal, and went 1 for 6 from the free throw line in the final two minutes.

“It was just one of those classic psychological things where we thought the game was over and it wasn’t,” Mihalich said. “But it was good for us to be in a situation to have to make a defensive stop. We beat a dangerous team, a team that can really score points.”

Manhattan nearly forced overtime when Antoine Pearson intentionally missed a free throw with 0.3 seconds left, and Pickett’s follow-tip rimmed out.

Niagara got 25 points out of the center position. Freshman Scooter Gillette scored a career-high 11 points on 5 of 5 shooting. Kashief Edwards made 6 of 7 shots and scored 12 of his 14 points after halftime.

Anthony Nelson had 12 points, eight assists six rebounds, Benn had eight points, eight rebounds and three assists, and Rob Garrison had six points, three assists and three rebounds.

Demetrius Williamson had two points and three rebounds in 23 minutes off the bench. He was questionable to play because of a knee injury, and was replaced in the starting lineup by Edwards. Austin Cooley, limited in practice this week by a foot injury, played only four minutes.

“’Meech was close, but not quite himself,” Mihalich said. “Austin was tip-toeing around out there.”