Feb. 23, 2008
Box Score
Cedar Falls, Iowa- Robert Bush scored 13 of his team-high 16 points during a hot-shooting first half by the UIC men's basketball team in a 70-58 road win over Northern Iowa at the McLeod Center on O'Reilly ESPNU BracketBusters Saturday.
The Flames (15-13) never trailed in the contest, scoring the first five points of the game and proceeding to shoot 56 percent (14-for-25) from the floor in the opening 20 minutes.
Bush went 4-for-5 from the field and 3-for-3 from three-point range in the first half, and Robert Kreps hit four of his first six shots to chip in nine first-period points off the bench as the Flames built a 12-point advantage heading into intermission.
UIC would go up by as many as 16 early in the second half and maintained a double-digit lead for most of the stanza. The Panthers (15-13) would get within seven with 2:41 remaining, but the Flames scored seven unanswered points in just over a minute to pull away.
Kreps, Josh Mayo and Jeremy Buttell scored 13 points apiece. Buttell also pulled down nine rebounds.
The Flames finished the game shooting 52.3 percent (23-for-44) from the field and 50 percent (8-for-16) from beyond the arc against the Missouri Valley Conference's top-ranked defense.
Eric Coleman led UNI with 26 points and 11 rebounds.
UIC improved to 5-1 all-time in BracketBuster games.
UIC rounds out the regular season with a pair of Horizon League games in the state of Wisconsin this weekend. The Flames begin the two-game trip this Thursday, Feb. 28 at Green Bay.
