NORMAL, Ill. --- Senior guards Jaron Martin and Luke Nelson scored 24 and 17 points, respectively, but UC Irvine fell to Illinois State, 85-71, in the NIT first round at Doug Collins Court at Redbird Arena in Normal, Ill., Wednesday night.
Martin was 9 of 17 from the field, including 5 of 10 on threes, as he registered his 10th 20-point game of the season for UCI, which finishes with a 21-15 overall mark.
Martin ends his career No. 6 on the UCI all-time list with 190 treys and he scored 1,062 points, the 27th Anteater player to reach 1,000.
Nelson also hit 5 of 10 threes as he extended his top mark in UCI history to 258 triples. His 17 points give him 1,531 for his career to rank No. 4 in the Anteater record book.
He had nine assists Wednesday night to end his career with 415, fourth-best in the UCI record book, and he registered a career-high five steals against the Redbirds to finish his career with 145 for No. 5 in Anteater history.
Senior center Ioannis Dimakopoulos had nine points and five rebounds in his final Anteater game while sophomore forward Jonathan Galloway pulled down a game-high 11 rebounds, marking the 10th time this season he reached double-digit boards.
Galloway scored six points, freshman guard Eyassu Worku five and freshman forward Tommy Rutherford grabbed five rebounds.
Illinois State (28-6), the NIT's top seed, was led by Deontae Hawkins with 22 points as he was 6 of 6 from three-point range.
MiKyle McIntosh and Paris Lee added 13 points apiece as the Redbirds improved to 16-0 at home this season.
Both teams were cooking from three-point range in the first half with Illinois State hitting 7 of 12 (.583) and UCI 8 of 14 (.571) as the Redbirds took a 43-34 lead at the break.
UCI closed to within six points at 61-55 on a three by Martin with 11:13 left, but Illinois State scored the next seven points, six on a pair of treys by Hawkins, to go up 68-55 with 9:42 remaining.
The 'Eaters pulled within 10 on three occasions after that, but the Redbirds maintained a twin-digit lead the remainder of the game.
Illinois State shot 52.5 percent from the field in the game and hit 13 of 25 from beyond the arc.
UCI hit 42.4 percent of its shots and was 13 of 30 from three-point range.
The 'Eaters did have a 19-9 advantage on second-chance points, but the Redbirds won the battle of the boards, 41-36, and committed just eight turnovers.
"I give Illinois State a great deal of credit, but I'm also proud of my team for the effort, the intensity and character they showed tonight," UCI head coach Russell Turner said.
"My three seniors have meant a lot to this program. They've been model student-athletes and I'm really proud of what we accomplished together."
UCI recorded its fifth consecutive season of at least 21 wins this season, just one of 22 schools to accomplish that in the past five years.
The 'Eaters advanced to the postseason each of the last five seasons, winning 114 games in that span.
