Nov. 25, 2008
Box Score
Washington, D.C.- The UIC men's basketball team broke open a close game with a decisive 28-9 run to start the second half in a 68-54 victory over host Howard at Burr Gymnasium on Tuesday night.
Scott VanderMeer scored 13 points and pulled down 12 rebounds to register his 10th career double-double for the Flames (2-2). The senior center also blocked five shots.
Robo Kreps also added 13 while Josh Mayo scored 12.
The Bison (1-4) shot 53.8 percent in the first half, led by Eugene Myatt's hot showing. Myatt made six of his nine first-half attempts, many of them off-balanced and contested, for 13 points in the opening 20 minutes to stake Howard to a four-point advantage at intermission.
But the Flames came out fired up on both ends of the floor after the halftime break. UIC used a quick 7-0 run, capped by a Mayo three-pointer, to begin the session and retake the lead.
Howard would cut the deficit down to one, but another Mayo trey helped the Flames rattle off 14 unanswered points to build a double-digit lead that proved to be insurmountable.
Spencer Stewart (seven points, eight rebounds, six assists) highlighted the UIC outburst at the 8:40 mark with a no-look behind-the-back bounce pass to Kreps for an easy layup that pushed the Flames' advantage to 13. UIC would go up by as many as 16 before the evening was finished.
"We made some changes in the second half and we handled the ball better," said UIC head coach Jimmy Collins. "Howard presented a real challenge to us in the first half. Our zone slowed them down in the second half."
The Flames' aggressive zone defense forced the Bison into a huge drop in their field goal shooting, as Howard made just 29.2 percent (7-for-24) from the floor after the break. Myatt only scored six more points on 2-for-6 shooting.
The Bison got a heavy dose of Rob Eppinger early. The 6-foot-8 UIC forward scored nine points on 4-of-5 shooting inside in just 13 first-half minutes.
Eppinger and VanderMeer were just two of the reasons UIC outscored Howard by a 40-16 margin in the paint.
UIC returns home to host Central Michigan at the UIC Pavilion this Saturday, Nov. 29 at 7 p.m.
