PIKEVILLE, Ky. -- Darrion Leslie tallied season-highs of 24 points and 13 rebounds to help the 14th-ranked University of Pikeville men's basketball team push past Maine at Fort Kent 88-69 on Wednesday in the East Ky. Expo Center.

It was UPIKE's final non-conference tune up as it improved to 20-5 overall, giving head coach Kelly Wells his fifth straight season leading the Bears to at least 20 wins. In the last 11 seasons, Pikeville has had 20 or more wins in nine of them.

While it was truly Leslie's night, the Bears also got 14 points with the help of four 3s from Clint Nwosuh, 12 points and seven rebounds from Marshall Bennett and Jordan Perry joined them in double figures with 11 points off the bench.

Joe McCloskey paced the Bengals (19-7) with 19 points and five rebounds, followed by Rosevelt Smith Jr., with 16 points.

UPIKE outshot UMFK 51.6 to 45.5 percent from the field and controlled the backboards 43-29. The Bears ended up with three extra 3-pointers, two more made free throws and three less turnovers at 15-12.

HOW IT WENT DOWN

Maine Fort Kent led the game just once at 2-1 on a layup by McCloskey, but flash forward seven minutes and UPIKE had already pulled in front by double digits at 17-7 with 12:35 on the clock. An 11-4 run that ended with a Nwosuh 3 followed to push the gap to 17 three minutes later.

But that large lead wasn't safe as the Bears cooled down from the field and allowed the Bengals to outscore them 23-11 to cut the deficit to just five points at the 2:58 mark after two Smith Jr., free throws. UPIKE was able to score the final four points of the half to lead 43-34 at halftime.

A 10-4 UPIKE run got the second-half started and stopped any worries of UMFK coming all the way back as the lead was back to 15 at 53-38 when Trey Rakes went 3-for-4 from the stripe after shooting and technical fouls were called back-to-back.

The Bears used that momentum to push their lead to a game high of 20 points three times the rest of the game, with the latest coming at 76-56 with 4:20 to play.

UMFK made one more late push with an 11-3 spurt over the next three minutes to get within 12 points, but that's as close as it would get as the Bears scored seven unanswered points in the final minute.

UP NEXT

Mid-South Conference play resumes at 4 p.m. ET on Saturday with UPIKE hosting Life.

-UPIKE-