Feb. 11, 2006

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Contact: Brian McCann

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- The UW-Milwaukee trio of Joah Tucker, Boo Davis and Adrian Tigert combined to score 50 points to lead the Panthers to an 86-57 win over Cleveland State on Saturday night in the Wolstein Center.

Cleveland State struggled offensively, shooting a season-low .298 from the field (17-57) in dropping its sixth straight loss to fall to 8-15 overall and 4-9 ion league play. UW-Milwaukee, which entered the game in first place in the Horizon League standings, one-game ahead of Butler, improved to 18-6 overall and 11-3 conference action.

Tucker and Davis paced the Panthers with 17 points each while Tigert scored 16 with a game-high 10 rebounds before leaving the game with a leg injury with 10:48 left.

Victor Morris led CSU with a season-high 12 points while Ije Nwankwo added 11 before fouling out with 6:07 left.

"I am a high-character, high-effort kind of guy and I demand that from my players," CSU head coach Mike Garland said. "I have not seen either of those two characteristics out of my team in either game this week and I am not going to put up with it.

"Take nothing away from (UW-) Milwaukee because they clearly are the best team in this league, but we did not give them our best effort. I can put up with missed shots, mistakes and in some cases, turnovers, but I can't accept a team that does not leave everything on the court."

The Vikings seemed to be playing uphill all night long as the Panthers gradually built a 48-31 halftime lead. CSU trailed just 34-26 with 5:26 remaining in the first half, but UW-Milwaukee ran off 14 of the next 16 points to open a 48-20 advantage with 1:17 left. A Raheem Moss trey with 18 seconds left rounded out the first half scoring.

UW-Milwaukee kept the pressure on after the break, scoring the first four points to push the lead to 53-31 with 18:04 left. A subsequent 11-0 spurt would extend the advantage to 70-39 with 9:33 left.

The Vikings would run off 10 straight points of their own to close to within 21, but CSU would come no closer down the stretch.

Cleveland State returns to the road for the final time during the regular season when the Vikings play at Wright State on Wednesday night (Feb. 15). CSU then returns home for three straight games to finish the season.