CINCINNATI — The Muskies did it again!

After a nail-biting back and forth second half, the Xavier Musketeers beat the UC Bearcats 80-77 in the 2022 Crosstown Shootout.

Coming out strong from the start, the Xavier Musketeers headed into halftime leading the UC Bearcats 41-24. In the second half, UC rallied to tie Xavier with David Dejulius' four-point play with 11 seconds left on the clock.

Despite the effort, Xavier's Souley Boum secured the win for the Muskies with free throws in the last few seconds of the game.

This was the fourth consecutive win for the Muskies in the almost century-old rivalry.

Last season, Xavier won 83-63 at the Cintas Center. Despite Saturday's loss, UC hold a 51-39 lead against Xavier in the long-standing basketball tradition.

The Musketeers will next face Southern University, whereas the Bearcats will face Miami University.

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CINCINNATI — The University of Cincinnati's success on the football field hasn't deterred its students from other priorities – like the Bearcats' rivalry with Xavier University.

While UC students were guarding the Oscar Robertson statue outside Fifth-Third Arena on Wednesday night, Xavier's D'Artagnan statue was hit with eggs and slices of cheese.

The incident comes days before UC plays at Xavier in the Crosstown Shootout. The game is Saturday at 8:30 p.m. on FS`1.

In what has become a tradition, UC students were deployed around the Oscar Robertson statue this week in defense of potential Xavier pranksters.

"The week before the Crosstown Shootout, Xavier fans will try to put a (Xavier) jersey on Oscar," Cam Kirzner, an Operations Mangement major, said. "So what we do is camp out all night throughout the week. We run games and activities for students, do giveaways and make sure that Xavier doesn't mess with Oscar."

D'Artagnan was picked as Xavier's mascot in 1925, when the college took the nickname the Musketeers from the classic Alexandre Dumas novel "The Three Musketeers." A statue of D'Artagnan was first placed on campus in 1968. It was replaced with a newer statue in 2000, when Xavier's Cintas Center opened.

The Robertson statue honors the Hall of Fame guard who played with the Bearcats and starred in the NBA with the Cincinnati Royals and the Milwaukee Bucks. He was the first NBA player to average a triple-double in a season and the only player until 2017, when Russell Westbrook duplicated the feat. Robertson led the Bearcats to two Final Fours and won a gold medal with the 1960 Olympic team.

Correction: The last name of Cam Kirzner was misspelled in this article. It has been corrected.