ST. PAUL, Minn. – The Concordia Golden Bears (9-17, 7-15 NSIC) closed out the regular season on a high note as they cruised to a 93-61 win over Upper Iowa (18-10, 15-7 NSIC) on Saturday night.
 
The Golden Bears are expected to earn the seventh seed in the NSIC South and will likely travel to Minnesota Duluth, the second seed in the NSIC North, in the first round of the NSIC/Sanford Health Basketball Tournament on Wednesday night.
 
CSP shifted the tide back in their favor in the series with UIU as they improved to 15-18 all-time against the Peacocks with the win.
 
Concordia dominated the action on both ends of the court as they connected on an impressive 59.3% (32-54) from the floor while holding Upper Iowa to just 33.8% (23-68) for the game. The gap was even larger from beyond the arc as CSP hit 58.3% (14-24) from three-point range while UIU hit just 16.7% (5-30). The Golden Bears set the tone in the opening half as they hit a scintillating 66.7% (18-27) of their shots compared to 27.8% (10-36) for their opponents.
 
In addition to the shooting advantage, CSP cleaned up on the glass as they held a 43-26 rebounding advantage to aid the effort in the win.
 
Concordia's starting five played a big role in the win as all five reached double figures while combining for 84 of the team's 93 points in the win with all five shooting better than 50% from the floor.
 
Jordan Coblin put up a huge stat line as he flirted with a triple-double, putting up 21 points, 10 assists and seven rebounds. He hit 6-11 from the floor, 3-5 from deep and 6-7 from the free throw line on the night. Carlos Barela added a similarly full line with 19 points on 5-9 shooting and 4-6 from deep with a career-best 13 boards to go along with four assists.
 
Cody Carlson contributed an extremely efficient performance as he hit seven of his nine shots and four of his five threes to finish with 18 points, six rebounds and five assists while Lee Higgins poured in 16 points and three boards. Max Keefe closed out his Gangelhoff Center career in style on Senior Day as he reached double figures for the sixth consecutive game and ninth time in the last 10 with 10 points on 4-7 shooting.
 
UIU's Duax brothers, Lucas and Max, each put up 10 points to lead the way for the Peacocks in the loss.
 
Concordia wasted little time in establishing a comfortable lead as they scored 15 of the first 17 points of the night before growing their lead from there. The lead reached 16 at 29-13 with 8:09 to go in the half before the Peacocks temporarily cut it back to a dozen at the under-five media timeout. It was all CSP from there as they closed out the half on a 14-3 run to push the lead to 46-23 after 20 minutes of play.
 
After the two teams traded buckets to start the second half, the Golden Bears was right back at it as they blew the game open with another massive run, this time a 20-3 burst, to bring the overall run to 36-8 and the score to 68-28 with 13:46 to play. The lead comfortably remained above 30 for the remainder of the night as the Golden Bears cruised to the 93-61 victory.