NEW ORLEANS - Junior guard Bryce Monroe pumped in a career-high 29 points and the Jaguars shot 63 percent from the field, but fell just short against host New Orleans at the Big Easy Classic on Thanksgiving Day, 87-84. Junior Jlynn Counter finished with 16 points and Chris Osten recorded his third double-double of the season with 14 points and 10 rebounds. Junior John Egbuta also finished in double-figures with 11 points and six rebounds. 

K'mani Doughty led five New Orleans (2-3) players in double-figures with 20 points on 7-of-11 shooting.

The game featured nine lead changes and 13 ties, the last coming with 1:31 remaining when Monroe dropped in a layup from point blank range. Doughty followed with a putback of a miss with 59.4 seconds left to give the hosts the lead for good. IUPUI had a chance to tie, but threw the ball away on an inbounds pass, leading to a Simeon Kirkland fast break bucket. 

IUPUI (1-5) cut the lead back to three when Egbuta split a pair of free throws with 24 seconds left and followed with a defensive stop to regain possession with 14 ticks left. Monroe fired a long potential game-tying three from the wing that Osten tipped in with three seconds left. Forced to foul, UNO's Jordan Johnson sank both ends of a one-and-one with 2.0 seconds left and Egbuta came up just short on a half court heave at the final horn. 

"I'm proud of my guys," head coach Matt Crenshaw said. "We bounced back from a tough loss today and played really hard today. I thought Bryce was really good at breaking them down off the dribble and either getting all the way to the rim or setting up his teammates. 

"Offensively, we were really good but defensively, we just didn't get enough stops and there were times when we just didn't finish the possession by getting the defensive rebounds."

Monroe shouldered the load in the first half, scoring 17 of his career-high 29 in the first half. The Privateers honed in on Monroe for much of the second half, which allowed Counter to score 14 of his 16 after intermission. 

IUPUI came out strong, building a quick 9-2 lead before things leveled off. UNO later took a 22-16 lead before settling for a 45-42 halftime lead. 

UNO finished the game shooting 53 percent overall and 9-of-20 (45 percent) from three. IUPUI went 4-of-5 from three in the opening half and finished 5-of-12 (41.7 percent). 

UNO outscored IUPUI 37-7 off the bench as Amhad Jarrard tallied six points off the bench and Boston Stanton III added a free throw in two minutes of work. IUPUI's bench attempted just three shots, all coming from Jarrard. 

The Jaguars will return to action on Friday (Nov. 25) when they face The Citadel at 5:00 p.m. Eastern to cap the three-game event.