UT Permian Basin men's basketball claimed its first NCAA Tournament victory and head coach Andy Newman his 100th career victory at UTPB as the Falcons advanced in the South Central Regional with an 87-69 victory over UA Fort Smith Saturday night at First United Bank Center in Canyon, Texas.

The Falcons couldn't have started the game off hotter, leading 11-3 in the first four minutes of the game.

UTPB played perhaps its best defensive half of the season in the opening 20, minutes, holding Fort Smith to just one field goal in its first 16 shots.

Garrett Baggett provided a spark off the bench, hitting three from 3-point range to help push the Falcon lead to 37-11 at 7:14.

A McPherson triple before the end of the first half capped a 7-0 run to end the first and give UTPB its largest lead of the game 49-19.

The big lead proved beneficial as Fort Smith scored early and often to start the second half, scoring 17 points in the first 3:28 to close the game to 19 points, but the Lions never got closer than 18 points the rest of the night.

Josh Morris set a new career-high in scoring, hitting 12-17 from the field for 28 points to lead all scorers. Daeshon Francis added 18 points and nine rebounds, McPherson scored 12 points, and Sammy Allen had eight rebounds in the first four minutes of the game to lead all players with 15 rebounds to go with a game-high eight assists.

Ladarius Coleman scored 23 of his UAFS-leading 25 points in the second half for Fort Smith, also leading the Lions with 10 boards.

The Falcons advance to Sunday night's first NCAA South Central Regional semi-final contest, facing Regis at 5 p.m. The Rangers won the Rocky Mountain Athletic Conference Tournament last week and advanced earlier today with an 87-82 win over Dallas Baptist.