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MUNCIE, IN- The season came to an end for the UB men's basketball team Wednesday evening with a 78-59 loss at Ball State University. The Bulls finished their first season in the Mid-American Conference with a 5-24 overall record and a 1-17 conference mark.

The Bulls started off hot, jumping out to an 8-3 lead and a 12-5 lead in the first four minutes of the game. Alexei Vasiliev (St. Petersburg, Russia) was the hot hand early for UB. Vasiliev hit two three-pointers to open the game and then a driving layup for UB's first eight points. Vasiliev then assisted on a behind the back pass to Nate Johnson (O'Fallon, IL/O'Fallon) to give the Bulls an early lead. The Cardinals would fight back, eventually knotting the game at 19-19 with 7:13 left in the first half.

The game went back and forth for the next few minutes, with UB taking its last lead, 23-22, with 6:12 left on a jumper by Louis Campbell (Rahway, NJ/Rahway). Ball State then used an 8-0 run to extend the lead to seven points before UB closed the half on a 6-2 run and trailed 32-29 going into halftime.

Ball State (16-10, 10-8) used some long distance shooting in the second half to open up the lead. The Cardinals hit six three-pointers in the first eight minutes of the second half, including four by Mickey Hosier, and pushed their lead to 16 points, 54-38, with 12:22 remaining. The Bulls could not fight back from those early second half three-pointers and closed the book on their season with the 76-59 loss.

Vasiliev led the Bulls in a break out game for him, scoring a game and career-high 28 points on 10-of-17 shooting, including five three-pointers. Nikolai Alexeev (Minsk, Belarus) added eight points and a game and career-high 14 rebounds, 12 coming on the defensive end. Ball State was led by Marcus Mason, one of five Cardinals in double figures, with 16 points. Freshman Lonnie Jones came off the BSU bench to add 13 points and 11 rebounds in 20 minutes of play.