SANTA BARBARA, Calif. --- Luke Nelson and Jaron Martin scored 14 points each and UC Irvine held off UC Santa Barbara, 66-62, in a Big West Conference game at Santa Barbara Thursday night.

Nelson scored the final 11 points of the first half in the last 2:53 as UCI took a 32-25 lead at the  break. Martin scored all of his 14 points in the second half as the Anteaters won their fifth straight game in improving to 10-9 overall and 3-0 in the Big West.

Martin added six assists while Nelson had four along with two steals. Martin hit 4 of 8 threes to move into eighth all-time at UCI with 153 treys while Nelson was 3 of 7 from beyond the arc in the victory.

Jonathan Galloway had a team-high seven rebounds for UCI, Martin had six, Nelson five and Ioannis Dimakopoulos and Tommy Rutherford grabbed four each as the teams battled to a 36-36 tie on the boards.

UCI led by as many as 15 points in the second half, but the Gauchos (2-12, 0-2) closed to within two at 64-62 on a pair of free throws by J.D. Slajchert with 1:33 remaining.

Dimakopoulus sealed the win for the Anteaters by hitting two foul shots with 18 seconds left as UCI won in Santa Barbara for the second straight season. Dimakopoulos scored eight points in the win, as did Rutherford.

Gabe Vincent led UCSB with 15 points while Eric Childress and Slajchert added 12 each.

UCI hit 10 of 25 threes and the Anteaters shot 43.3 percent overall from the field to the Gauchos 41.4 percent. UCSB was 6 of 13 from three-point range.

Each team committed eight turnovers and the Anteaters' bench outscored UCSB's 26-15.

UCI hosts Cal State Fullerton Saturday at 5:00 p.m. in a Big West contest at the Bren Events Center.