Feb. 27, 2007

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CHICAGO - Josh Mayo made all 14 of his free throws and scored 22 points to lead the University of Illinois at Chicago to an 83-77 win over the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in a Horizon League Tournament First Round game Tuesday night at the UIC Pavilion.

With the win, UIC (14-17) advances to face third-seeded Loyola Friday at 5 p.m. CST in Dayton, Ohio, in the quarterfinals. UWM sees its season end at 9-22.

Paige Paulsen scored 17 points and Ricky Franklin added 16 to lead the Panthers, who led by as many as 10 in the first half but could not hold off the Flames in the second 20 minutes.

Robert Bush added 21 points for UIC, which made 29-of-33 from the free throw line to hold off a late UWM comeback.

The Flames took the lead for good at 41-40 on a Bush three-pointer with 17:32 remaining in the game and eventually led 56-46 with 9:45 remaining. The Panthers did fight back to within two at 68-66 with 1:54 left and again to within three at 77-74 with 24.1 seconds left but could never completely close the gap.

"We started off shooting the ball well and I thought the extra pass is what we really wanted to get done," UWM head coach Rob Jeter said. "I thought we got away from that a little bit in the middle part of the first half. We settled for a couple of shots there instead of making the extra pass. So, instead of coming into the half up by two, we were hoping to have a little more cushion than that and be in a little better position based on how we started the game."

The Panthers were in control of the game for much of the first half before a late run got UIC back to within two points at the break.

The Flames took their only lead of the half when a Bush three made it 8-7 with 17:54 remaining in the half. The Panthers responded to that with a 10-run over the next four minutes, building a 17-8 edge on a Franklin layin with 14 minutes to play.

UWM then held 10-point leads on four different occasions, with the final one coming at 31-21 with 6:10 remaining. But, the Flames finished the half on a 13-5 run, capped by a Jovan Stefanov three with 1:03 left, to pull within 36-34 after 20 minutes.

The Panthers rebuilt a four-point lead in the first 49 seconds of the second half but gave the lead up for good about two minutes later. UIC's 56-46 lead came on another three-pointer by Bush and the Flames still led 67-58 on a three-point play by Scott Vandermeer with 5:05 left.

UWM's late rally was sparked by seven-straight points from Avery Smith, with his three-point play bringing to Panthers to within two at 68-66 with 1:53 remaining. But, the Flames responded with a dunk from Vandermeer after breaking UWM's press and Mayo hit eight free throws in the final 1:30 to allow UIC to seal the win.

"Although we made mistakes, I thought we did it with some aggressiveness. Now, we just have to get back to developing better habits," Jeter said. "That's where this team is at. The effort is there, but the execution is slightly sloppy at times."