CONWAY, Ark. _ The University of Central Arkansas Bears turned to a senior and a freshman to earn a hard-fought 82-78 victory over the Morehead State Eagles on Monday night at the Farris Center.

Senior Mathieu Kamba had 20 points and eight rebounds and freshman DeAndre Jones scored a career-high 16 points as the Bears overcame an eight-point second-half deficit and improved to 4-3 on the season. Senior guard Jordan Howard had an off night shooting but handed out a career-high 11 assists and added 16 points. 

"I'm really pleased with our effort,' said UCA head coach Russ Pennell. "And what we have to understand is, the majority of our games will be like this. They just will. There are going to be three or four possessions that are going to make or break the game. I thought Thatch (Unruh) had a little moment there where he got us going, and I was really proud that Jordan trusted his teammates late and got DeAndre the ball twice for two big threes.' 

The Bears led by as much as 10 points early in the game but the Eagles (1-5) made a furious comeback, including a half-court shot at the buzzer, to close to within 39-37 at the break.

"I thought the first half we were really impatient on offense,' said Pennell. "One of the things that happens in games sometimes is if you get  off to a good start, it seems almost like it's too easy. I think what happens is you get this false security and you start just throwing up anything thinking it's going to go in. And Jordan certainly didn't have one of his better shooting nights, and I think that kind of threw us off early.

"But what I really liked, even though they shot 52 percent, I thought the shots they took were tough. And I thought down the stretch, our defense was what really kind of got the game under control. I thought we guarded the ball really well, and when you play Morehead State, you have to do that, because they are really good off the bounce. They attack the rim pretty well. And what I liked, this is the first time they haven't had double digit offensive rebounds. They are a very good offensive rebounding team and we held them to nine offensive rebounds, which I thought was a big, big factor in the game.'
 

The Bears trailed by six points with a little more than 9:00 left but an 8-0 run by Unruh, including a pair of three-pointers, got the lead back for the Bears for good at the 6:00 mark.  Jones then added his fourth and fifth three-pointers at the 3:15 mark and with 44.1 seconds left. MSU got within 81-78 on a pair of free throws with 26.6 seconds left but Howard made 1 of 2 at the line and Jones and freshman center Hayden Koval combined to force a turnover with 10.8 left to seal it. 

"I think they were so keyed on Jordan, that anytime he would attack, DeAndre wound up being open,' said Pennell. "And Jordan ended up with a career-high 11 assists. And the thing that excites me about that is we challenged him at halftime, you don't have it going today and that's fine. But you can still impact the game if you're a willing passer, and boy did he show that in that second half.'

The Bears shot 46 percent overall and made 10 of 28 from three-point range, but just 14 of 24 (58.3 percent) from the free-throw line. MSU made 7 of 15 (46.7) from the line.

UCA plays the first of two games against the Little Rock Trojans at 6:30 Wednesday at the Jack Stephens Center in Little Rock.