NORTH CANTON, Ohio - The #5-seed Missouri-St. Louis Tritons extended their 10-game winning streak and ended their five-game drought over the #4-seed Truman State Bulldogs in the opening round of the NCAA Midwest Regional 73-68 on Friday night. The Bulldogs see their season come to an end with a final record of 20-10.

Eric Northweather matched his career-high with 27 points with his fourth three-pointer of the night to bring the Bulldogs to within one at 69-68 with 2:16 to play.

Truman State forced a miss by UMSL on the defensive end but a bad pass led to a steal on the Bulldog's next offensive set that gave the ball back to the Tritons. Yaakema Rose missed a jumper that didn't catch rim and went out of bounds. Truman was able to force the shot clock violation and again had a chance to go up with 53 seconds to play.

Out of the timeout, an entry pass into Cade McKnight was poked away by Rose, giving UMSL 10 steals on the night. Rose converted on both free throws after being fouled and the Tritons had a three-point lead with 19.9 on the clock.

The Bulldogs last attempt to pull even with UMSL was a challenged three-pointer by Mason Miller that missed the mark, the ball hit a Truman player fighting for the rebound and went out of bounds.

Shane Wissink iced the victory with two free throws with 5.4 seconds remaining.

UMSL had 30 more shot attempts (73-43) than the Bulldogs with 18 second chance points and 18 offensive rebounds compared to Truman's five offensive boards and four second chance points.

Six Triton players scored in double-figures with Wissink leading with 15. He would hit two deep three-pointers in the first half, one that was banked in. Marquis Collins added 12 with a clutch three at the halftime buzzer that broke a 37-all tie.

Northweather was 9-of-13 from the field and 4-of-6 from outside and added five blocks and seven rebounds. Masen Miller added 16, with nine coming from the free throw line and McKnight scored 14 after picking up two early fouls on the offensive en just 3:30 into the game.

There were 11 ties and 10 lead changes and neither team led by more than seven points. 

UMSL moves on to play top-seeded and host Walsh (Ohio) University on Saturday evening.