LEWISBURG, Pa. – Senior Conor O’Brien (Mt. Sinai, N.Y./St. Anthony’s) and freshman Brendan Burgdorf (Westfield, N.J./The Pingry School) scored two goals apiece and the Bucknel(m)l men’s soccer team improved to 8-3 on the season with a convincing 5-1 win over St. Peter’s on Tuesday night at Emmitt Field at Holmes Stadium.

Each of Bucknell’s first seven wins had come by just a single goal, five of them by 1-0 margins. That trend ended with a bang in this one, as the Bison racked up their most goals in a game since a 5-4 win at Canisius early last season. It was their largest margin of victory since a 5-1 home win over Niagara in 2002.

The margin might have been even more one-sided if not for some terrific saves by St. Peter’s goalkeeper Carlos Suarez. The freshman from Bolivia stopped two breakaways and two other point-blank shots while finishing with eight saves.

The Bison needed only 8:46 to get on the board, when Burgdorf, stationed at the near post, headed in a corner kick from CK Kumah (Accra, Ghana/The Hotchkiss School).

Bucknell took its first two-goal lead of the season in the 29th minute. Freshman back Jermaine Jarrett (Kingston, Jamaica/The Hotchkiss School) sent classmate Josh Plump (Millburn, N.J./Millburn) into wide open space along the right flank, and O’Brien finished Plump’s centering pass for a 2-0 lead.

It seemed as though the Bison would take that two-goal margin into the locker room, but with only 19 seconds left in the half a St. Peter’s player split two defenders and was taken down in the box, resulting in a penalty kick. Michael Atehortua scored on the PK to make it a 2-1 game.

The Peacocks (2-6) came out with plenty of energy in the first five minutes of the second half, but the Bison weathered the storm and countered with their third goal of the night in the 51st minute. Ryan Sappington (Barboursville, Va./Shattuck St. Mary’s) passed to O’Brien at the top of the box. O’Brien faked a shot to let a defender slide past, then fired a hard low shot past Suarez for his second goal of the night and Patriot League-high ninth of the season.

The nine goals are a new career high for O’Brien, and he moved into ninth place on Bucknell’s career list with 24, surpassing Bucknell Hall of Famer Art Raynor, who had 23 from 1947-49.

Just under 14 minutes later the Bison made it 4-1, this time benefitting from a rare goalkeeper assist. Tommy Caso (Phoenix, Md./McDonogh), who made three saves in the game, sent a long boot well past midfield, where Luke Joyner (Dallas, Texas/J.J. Pearce) flicked a header forward to Burgdorf. The freshman striker settled the ball and fired a low shot into the left side of the net for his first career multi-goal game.

Joyner finished the scoring in the 76th minute, but senior Alex Meisel (Newton, Conn./Newton) did most of the work. Meisel controlled the ball at the top of the 18 with defenders all around him. He managed to weave his way through traffic to the left side of the box and chipped a perfect pass over another defender right onto Joyner’s head for the easy finish in the goal mouth.

Meisel, Jarrett and Caso all earned their first career points with their assists. Kumah, who had a goal earlier in the season, collected his first collegiate assist. All told, the Bison received two goals and three assists from freshmen and a goal and three assists from sophomores.

Will Byrne (Harrisburg, Pa./Susquehanna) saw his first action of the season in goal, coming on for the final 19:28. He made two saves, including a tremendous diving stop on Zabit Ahmati not long after entering.

Coach Brendan Nash cleared the bench for the final 15 minutes, and he used every healthy field player in the game. At one point in the final minutes the Bison had seven freshmen on the field at the same time, including first-time participants Phil Parsons (Hamilton, Bermuda/Saltus Grammar), Charlie Pirc (Airmont, N.Y./Suffern), Ryan Foreman (Wilmette, Ill./New Trier) and Collin Costello (Bethlehem, Pa./Freedom). Junior Eric Ferson (Amherst, N.H./Souhegan) also saw his first action of the year.

Next up for Bucknell is a key Patriot League home match against Holy Cross on Saturday at 1 p.m. That will be the 1,000th contest in program history.