NORMAL, Ill. - The IUPUI basketball team fell into a first half hole and never fully recovered at Illinois State on Wednesday night (Nov. 30) as the Jaguars dropped a non-conference affair inside Redbird Arena, 77-63. Senior Matt O'Leary tallied a team-high 17 points on 8-of-14 shooting and grabbed seven boards in the loss. Junior Ron Patterson added 15 and senior Darell Combs pumped in 13. 

Paris Lee led five Illinois State (3-2) players in double-digits with 18 points, six boards and six assists. MiKyle McIntosh added 14 and Deontae Hawkins finished with 13 in just 20 minutes. 

Illinois State bullied its way to a 42-31 rebounding advantage and outscored IUPUI 40-22 in close, but it was early turnovers that ultimately did the Jags in. 

"I liked our fight tonight, especially in the second half," IUPUI Head Coach Jason Gardner said. "(Illinois State) is a quick twitch, athletic team and they caused us some trouble early. I think we were just a little more careless with the basketball and that allowed them to get some easy baskets in transition and kind of get some momentum against us."

IUPUI (2-5) was content to compete in a track meet early and took a 12-11 lead after O'Leary stuck a jumper at the 13:51 mark before halftime. However, turnovers began to pile up for the Jags and Illinois State rattled off a 14-2 run to build a 25-14 lead. The lead grew as high as 18 before intermission before Combs stroked a trey at the final horn to make it 44-29 at the break. 

However, IUPUI came out revitalized to start the second half and tried to make a game of it. Better offensive execution helped the Jaguars get in the bonus with more than 13 minutes left in the contest as Aaron Brennan made it an 11-point game with two freebies at the 13:30 mark. In what would be a common occurrence for the final 13-plus minutes though, each time IUPUI made a run, the Redbirds had an answer. 

Lee drilled an open three and assisted on a DJ Clayton transition basket to push ISU's lead back to 16 with 12:46 to play. 

Later, it was Patterson who sparked a 9-2 run that cut ISU's lead back to 64-53 with 7:36 left. The Syracuse-transfer assisted on an O'Leary layup, drilled a long three and then got loose on a secondary break for a left-handed layup that prompted ISU to call timeout. After Combs picked off a pass at the defensive end, he misfired on a wide open three-point attempt that would have made it an eight-point game with just under seven minutes to play. 

"It was a good look," Gardner said. "I think our whole bench was hoping it would go down and we'd continue that run. Again, I liked our second half energy and our fight and that we didn't back down, but we kept fighting and going at them." 

The Jags' final burst came when Kellon Thomas collected a steal and Patterson raced ahead for a two-handed dunk, making it a 67-57 game with 5:04 to play. The Jags again got another key defensive stand, but Thomas missed a pull-up jumper at the other end and ISU scored the game's next six points to salt away the outcome. 

"We got good looks," Gardner said. "We missed too many layups again tonight, but part of that was their size and athleticism inside. They did a good job of challenging and changing shots inside. We needed to do a better job of getting into their bodies and getting to the foul line, but they're a good team on the inside."

Illinois State harassed the Jags into a 39 percent shooting night while making an even 50 percent from the field at the other end. Thomas finished with nine points and sophomore Evan Hall had four points and seven rebounds. Brennan accounted for all of IUPUI's bench production, hitting 5-of-6 free throw attempts in the loss. 

O'Leary's team-high 17 gave him a career-high six straight games in double-digits. He and Combs are the only two Jaguars to have scored in double-figures in six of the team's seven games this season. 

The loss was the Jaguars' third straight and dropped IUPUI to 0-2 all-time against Illinois State. The Jaguars will continue the rugged road stretch on Saturday when they face Ball State at 2:00 p.m. inside Worthen Arena. That game will be broadcast on ESPN3 and can be heard on the iHeartRadio app as Morgan Adcock (pxp) will call the action from courtside.