ST. LOUIS – The University of Missouri-St. Louis men's basketball team led by as many as 19 points and then withstood a second half rally from Missouri S&T to hang on for a 78-75 victory on Thursday evening at the Mark Twain Building.

The Tritons improve to 8-10, 6-4 GLVC while the Miners drop to 9-8, 3-7 GLVC.

UMSL got off to a fast start scoring the first 11 points of the contest and held S&T scoreless for the first seven-plus minutes and without a field goal for nearly the first eight minutes of the game.

The Miners missed 11 of their first 12 shots to begin the game as the Tritons built a 16-point lead after an and one from Mayson Quartlebaum with 9:37 left in the opening half.

UMSL saw its lead cut to 13 with 5:08 left in the stanza after a jumper from Kaden Froebe but finished the first half strong scoring 10 of the final 16 points to take a 43-26 into the intermission.

The Tritons shot 53 percent (16-for-30) in the frame including 6-of-13 from three and were led by Quartlebaum with 18 points while Savon Wykle added seven and Kris O'Neal II chipped in with six.

Quartlebaum scored the first bucket of the second half to give UMSL its largest lead of the game at 45-26 but the Miners chipped away thanks to a 13-2 run over the next six minutes to pull within eight points after a three-pointer from Ikenna Okeke.

The Tritons countered with an 11-4 run of its own to stretch the lead back to 15 on a layup from Quartlebaum with 9:06 remaining in the contest.

S&T refused to go away pulling within 67-61 after a layup from Okeke with less than four minutes to go but a jumper from Troy Glover II and a three-pointer from O'Neal II extended the lead back to 11 less than a minute later.

The Miners scored nine of the next 11 points to pull within three on a jumper in the paint from Okeke then forced a turnover and had a chance to tie the game. Okeke's three from the top of the key rimmed out as Wykle got the rebound was fouled by Lovell Williams with 0:22 left.

He hit both free throws to make it a five-point game. After a miss by Williams, Terrell Kabala was fouled and hit 1-of-2 at the charity stripe to keep it a two-possession game.
Julien Smith brought S&T to within four with a jumper in the paint with 4.8 seconds left. Williams fouled Wykle on the inbounds pass and Wykle hit both free throws to seal the victory. Smith hit a three-pointer at the buzzer for the final margin.

UMSL finished the game shooting 51 percent (26-for-51) from the field including 9-of-23 from three and shot 71 percent at the foul line. It outrebounded the Miners 35-to-33 but turned the ball over 13 times. Quartlebaum matched his career-high with 26 points while O'Neal II finished with 16 points and Wykle dropped home 14 points.

S&T shot 53 percent (18-for-34) from the floor in the second half to finish the game shooting 46 percent. It was 8-of-25 from three and shot only 58 percent at the foul line. Smith led the Miners with 23 points and was joined in double figures by Okeke with 16 points, Froebe added 14 points and Cameron Stovall had 11 points off the bench.

The Tritons wrap up their homestand on Saturday afternoon hosting Maryville at 3 p.m. at the Mark Twain Building.