VICTORIA - The University of Victoria Vikes kept it close for 22 minutes before the No. 2 nationally ranked UBC Thunderbirds took over en route to a 103-75 win.

With the win, UBC clinches the Canada West regular season title, improving to 21-2 and winning their 17th straight game. UVic falls to 15-8 and needs to win on Saturday night in the rematch at 7 p.m. to finish in fourth spot and host the best-of-three Canada West quarter-final series with the Alberta Golden Bears, Feb. 25-27.

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Alex Murphy set a Canada West record, playing in his 110th consecutive game for UBC. He scored with a game-high 26 points.

"It was a high-tempo game and that's my style of game. It benefitted me personally and the team," Murphy said. "In the third quarter, we made a few stops and then we were running the ball down their throat."
"I'm proud our guys were able to turn this game around."

The Vikes led several times in a game that featured 14 lead changes and was entertaining and full of fastbreaks and furiously fast action.

"We played about 23 minutes of basketball tonight. We made way too many undisciplined mistakes," said Vikes men's basketball head coach Craig Beaucamp. "When we did fall apart, we did not collect ourselves. You're going to have lulls in games, and for (over) 20 minutes I felt we were relatively solid. But you cannot play 20 minutes and win a game against a championship-level team. To their credit they jumped on us."

#Jeff Cullen# led the Vikes with 19 points, including five three-pointers. #Ryan MacKinnon# added 16 points, six rebounds and six assists along with two steals in the loss.

The Vikes briefly led by five points in the second half - 45-40 - but then Whyte and his Thunderbirds teammate Nathan Yu took over, guiding UBC to a 29-8 run to end the third quarter. Eleven of those points came from Yu who had luck on his side, even hitting an ackward three-pointer after corralling the ball on an odd backboard-deflection to pull in the rebound and then launch the ball off-balance.

The Thunderbirds carried a 69-53 lead into the fourth quarter.

In other scores: Saskatchewan defeated Calgary 107-92, Lethbridge defeated Winnipeg 111-106 in overtime, Fraser Valley edged Brandon 75-68 and Regina defeated Manitoba 108-94.

The Vikes will retire the jersey of former Vikes star and national team player Gerald Kazanowski on Saturday Feb. 19 at 7 p.m. MORE INFORMATION

SCORING BY QUARTER
UBC        20    20    28    34 - 103
UVic        18    23    12    22 - 75