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Southern Illinois Hands Saint Mary's First Loss

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The Associated Press

Published: December 12, 2007

CARBONDALE, Ill. - Bryan Mullins scored 22 points and Southern Illinois used a tight defense to send No. 24 Saint Mary's to its first loss Tuesday night, beating the Gaels 71-56.
Southern Illinois (4-3) limited Saint Mary's (7-1) to a season-low 56 points.

Saint Mary's, which trailed 36-24 at the half, rallied to within six points with 4 minutes remaining, but Mullins scored nine points down the stretch and the Salukis held on for the win.

The Salukis broke a three-game losing streak that had knocked them out of the Top 25.

Saint Mary's leading scorer, freshman guard Patrick Mills, was held to 11 points after averaging 16.1 entering the game.

UCF 65, LA.-LAFAYETTE 52: Jermaine Taylor scored 18 points and Dave Noel had 14 as host UCF beat Louisiana-Lafayette.

Louisiana-Lafayette (1-5) trimmed a six-point halftime deficit to one with a 5-0 run at the beginning of the second half. UCF (5-4) responded with a 10-0 run to take a double-digit lead.

The Knights led by as many as 19 points in the second half.

Tony Davis finished with nine points and eight rebounds for UCF.

The Ragin Cajuns shot just 23 percent from the floor. David Dees and Elijah Milsap scored 13 points each for Louisiana-Lafayette.

UCF led 33-27 at halftime.

MINNESOTA: Coach Tubby Smith finalized a contract Tuesday that will pay him $1.75 million annually.

The seven-year contract - the largest for a university employee - was signed about nine months after the former Kentucky coach was hired to rebuild a Gophers program that lost a record 22 games last season.

"Certainly, we were happy to finally get everything finalized with our contract as well," Smith said. "We finally got that all done. The lawyers stretched it out long enough, but I'm happy to have that done."

Smith will get $250,000 in annual deferred retirement payments beginning in 2011. His contract also includes several incentives, such as $500,000 if the Gophers win the national championship and $250,000 for winning the Big Ten regular-season title.

PITTSBURGH: Freshman center Austin Wilson needs major left knee surgery to repair a fractured patella and will be out for the rest of the season.

Women

TENNESSEE: Kelley Cain, a freshman center for No. 1 Tennessee, had successful knee surgery Tuesday. The 6-foot-6 Cain, of Atlanta, will be lost for the season.

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