FAYETTE, Iowa – Nick Smith led a balanced scoring attack with 16 points to lead Southwest Minnesota State to an 81-71 road victory over Upper Iowa on Friday night in Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference men's basketball.

The victory for SMSU (10-8, 9-5 NSIC) snapped a two-game losing and broke UIU's three-game winning streak. 

Smith connected on 6 of 9 shot from the field and also grabbed seven rebounds.  Matt Zager added 15 points on 5 of 7 shooting, while Casey Sussenguth (11) and Lavione West (10) rounded out SMSU's double-digit scoring.  Jordan Miller and Vinard Birch each had eight points for the Mustangs, while Miller pulled down seven rebounds.

Joey Woods led UIU (7-11, 4-10 NSIC) with 24 points. 

SMSU finished the game shooting 56.5 percent from the field (26 of 46) with three 3-pointers in six attempts.  The Mustangs connected on 26 of 34 free throws and held a 28-26 rebound advantage.

SMSU stormed out of the gate, taking a 21-3 lead in the first four and a half minutes following a three-point play by Casey Sussenguth. 

Upper Iowa fought-back, putting together a 15-6 run in the next six minutes to cut the deficit to 27-18 with 9:25 remaining.  UIU continued to cut into the lead, trimming the lead to 30-22, before SMSU answered back with its own run and push the lead to 36-23 with six minutes left following a lay-up by Zager.

UIU came back again and held SMSU scoreless for the next six minutes and nearly rallied to tie the game, before SMSU settled for a 36-33 halftime lead.  SMSU scored just nine points in the final 10:33 of the half.

Trent Carlson hit a 3-pointer in the opening half and in the process became the 13th player in program history to make 100 career 3-pointers.

Zager led all scorers in the opening half with nine points, with SMSU shooting 58 percent (15 of 26) from the field. 

SMSU continued to build onto the lead to start the second half, taking a 54-43 lead with 13 minutes left on a jumper by William Giddings.  The lead was then extended to 61-48 with 8:46 on the clock following a lay-up by West and the Mustangs never looked back in returning to the win column.

Southwest Minnesota State wraps-up its four-game road trip tomorrow night with a match-up versus No. 6-ranked and conference-leading Winona State (18-2, 13-1 NSIC) starting at 7 p.m.