INDIANAPOLIS - The IUPUI basketball team continued riding a confident wave on Saturday (Feb. 13) as the Jaguars outlasted UIC, 88-81 inside Indiana Farmers Coliseum for a third win in four games. Senior Marcus Burk pumped in a game-high 34 points on 12-of-19 shooting and Jaylen Minnett added 23 points, including five treys. 

Senior Elyjah Goss registered his sixth straight double-double with 12 points, 12 rebounds and four assists and sophomore Mike DePersia just missed a double-double of his own with nine points, nine boards and five assists. 

IUPUI (7-8, 6-8 HL) shot a blistering 57.4 percent from the field and finished strong, making nine of its final 10 field goal attempts to fend off the Flames. Teyvion Kirk paced four UIC (8-11, 5-9 HL) players in double-digits with 21 points and RayQuawndis Mitchell and Braelen Bridges tallied 15 each off the bench. 

"I thought we did a good job of holding them to one shot and kept them off the three-point line all weekend," head coach Byron Rimm II said. "We stuck to the details and we let our defense lead to our great offense and that got our guys excited. I'm just happy that our guys lived up to what those three seniors bring - we call them the record breakers."

The Jaguars were relentless throughout, building a 40-35 halftime lead and never relinquishing the lead after intermission. Each time the Flames crept within striking distance, the Jaguars' prolific offense had an immediate counterpunch. 

UIC closed within five with 6:41 to play when Mitchell rattled in three, but IUPUI fired back when Goss spotted DePersia for a layup at the other end. After a defensive stand, Goss setup a Nathan McClure layup to push the lead back to nine. IUPUI closed the game by making nine of its final 10 field goal attempts 

Minnett hoisted daggers with back-to-back threes with 4;10 and 3:20 to play, the second of which pushed the lead to 10. UIC kept scoring at the opposite end, but couldn't muster stops against the Jags. IUPUI shot 64 percent in the second half and outrebounded UIC by a 39-27 margin. 

The Flames were limited to just 8-of-36 (22.2 percent) from three-point range while IUPUI made 9-of-20 (45 percent) against one of the nation's top defensive teams against the three. 

Burk shouldered the scoring load in the first half, tallying 15 points on nearly flawless shooting. He went over 1,000 in his IUPUI career early in the second half when he swished three straight free throws after drawing a bump from beyond the arc. He finished 12-of-19 from the floor while Minnett was 6-of-12 and 5-of-10 from deep. 

"Guys screened well and we cut hard and bought into the system that we have in place. We looked to get Burk and Jaylen the ball and those guys set great screens and popped out and did what was asked of them," Rimm said. "What helps is that Burk and Jaylen were able to get off the ball and get Nate and Mike a couple of touches for threes and (UIC) couldn't really help off them like they wanted. 

"Jaylen and Burk were able to straight line drive them and so we got a lot of drives. Even though we got some really good looks from three, we got a lot off drives and we kept driving them."

Burk, Minnett and Goss finished with 69 of the team's 88 points, doing so on just 39 field goal attempts. 

McClure finished with eight points including a pair of key buckets late as IUPUI improved to 6-4 with him in the starting lineup. The only non-starter to score was a first half tip-in from Azariah Seay while Dimitri Georgiadis provided four boards and a blocked shot in relief of Goss up front. 

"We've got great role players, guys who just do the little things to help you win," Rimm said. "We know we've got Batman and Robin and Superman out there on the floor at the same time, but those other guys like Nate and Mike and AZ and Bobby when he's here do a ton of the little things to make us successful."

IUPUI will return to action next weekend when it travels to Youngstown State for a two-game set, beginning on Friday (Feb. 18) at 5:00 p.m. inside YSU's Beeghly Center. Both games of the series will be aired on ESPN3.