GREELEY, Colo. -- The Thunderbird men's basketball team fell to the Northern Colorado Bears on the road Saturday night, as the home team was able to come away with a 97-80 victory.

Despite the loss, Thunderbird senior James McGee moved into No. 6 all-time on the SUU scoring list. McGee now has 1,253 points in his career, which propelled him past Robert Lee who played for the Thunderbirds from 1974-1977 and scored 1,249 points. McGee scored 17 on Saturday night.  

"We liked his aggressiveness," SUU head coach Todd Simon said. "We've been trying to get him more ways to score, and we need him to be that threat for us. Today that's what he was and that's what we needed."

Dre Marin knocked down a triple to score the first points of the game, and the T-Birds got going to lead 7-4 at the first media timeout.

As the opening half wore on, it was a back-and-forth affair, as the Bears took a 16-14 advantage at the under-eight media timeout. UNC continued to lead through the remainder of the opening half, taking a 38-33 advantage into the halftime break.  

The game never got out of hand, but the Bears held a healthy lead through the remainder of the contest and pulled away with a 97-80 victory.

"We defended for a stretch there in the first half, and then as (Andre) Spight and (Anthony) Johnson got hot we struggled, and they got too many points off turnovers on our end," Simon said.

Jamal Aytes led the Thunderbirds in scoring on Saturday night, finishing with 19 points on 9-of-12 shooting from the field. Behind McGee on the evening was Jadon Cohee, who finished with 16 points and shot 4-for-4 from the free throw line.

Dwayne Morgan finished the game with 8 points and six rebounds.

Andre Spight had a gigantic evening for Northern Colorado, hanging 40 on the Thunderbirds in 36 minutes of play. He finished 13-of-15 from the free throw line. Spight also had more assists in the contest than any other player with six.

"He caught fire and was making shots from three, taking us off the dribble, and he's caused problems for us and he did a great job," Simon said.

Anthony Johnson finished with 25 points in the contest for UNC.

The Thunderbirds will be home for the final two times of the 2017-18 season next week, as they'll host Portland State on Thursday, and Sacramento State on Saturday for Senior Day.

"We've got to have a couple good days of practice," Simon said. "Get back home, get healthy again so we can practice with a full deck and that way we can make some adjustments."

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