DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — The Penn State men’s basketball team secured its first 6-0 start to a season in 25 years with a wire-to-wire 85-66 win over Fordham Monday afternoon. The Nittany Lions now advance to Tuesday’s 4 p.m. Sunshine Slam championship game to face the winner of the Clemson vs. San Francisco game.

Penn State is now 6-0 for the first time since the 1999-2000 season. The Nittany Lions shot 52.6% from the field vs. the Rams and owned a 21-8 edge in second-chance points.

Nick Kern Jr. led Penn State with his first career double-double, scoring a game-high 20 points and pulling down a career-best 13 rebounds. Zach Hicks followed with 16 points, while Puff Johnson added 15. Ace Baldwin Jr. finished with 12 points, seven assists and four rebounds, while Yanic Konan Niederhauser tallied 12 points and seven rebounds in just 14 minutes of action.

Zach Hicks scored the first five points of the game to help Penn State get out to an early 7-2 lead four minutes into the contest.

A Yanic Konan Niederhauser layup sparked a 9-0 Nittany Lion run from 15:13 to 12:37 as Penn State pulled ahead 16-4.

The Nittany Lions were up by as much as 13 at the 8:09 mark following a Freddie Dilione V layup. Fordham made its next seven field goal attempts as the Rams used the next four minutes to trim the Penn State advantage all the way down to four at 30-26 with 4:22 left on the first-half clock.

A Dilione V jumper ignited an 11-2 Penn State streak from 4:03 to 1:31 as the Nittany Lions held Fordham without a field goal for over four minutes and Penn State reclaimed a double-digit edge at 41-28.

The Rams scored six of the final seven points of the half, but the Nittany Lions carried a 42-34 lead into halftime.

Ace Baldwin Jr. scored six points in the first 3:44 of the second half as the Nittany Lion lead sat at 54-43 four minutes into the term.

Fordham was within seven points at 56-49 before a Hicks triple kicked off a 9-0 Penn State run over the next 3:09 and the Nittany Lions pulled ahead 65-49 with 11:06 to play.

The Penn State run reached 16-1 following four points from Kern Jr. and another Johnson triple as the Nittany Lion lead expanded to 22 at 72-50 with 9:33 left on the clock.