MORRIS, Minn. - The Minnesota Morris men's basketball team was unable to hand Northwestern their first conference loss as the Eagles topped the Cougars 69-51 Saturday in UMAC basketball action at Jim Gremmels Court.

Northwestern forced Minnesota Morris to a season-low 34 percent shooting from the floor and held the Cougars to nearly 39 points below their season-scoring average.

Down early, the Cougars used an 8-0 run to tie the game at 15 following a Tyler Ukkelberg lay-in. Shortly thereafter, Jeremy Halverson's 3 gave the Cougars their first lead at 18-17. That lead was short-lived as the Eagles countered with a 10-0 run to go back up by 9. They would take a 35-22 lead going into the locker room.

Northwestern got its lead up to 22 in the second half. Back-to-back 3s from Noah Grove helped cut the deficit to 12 at 55-43 with 8:12 remaining, but that was all the closer the Cougars would get.

CD Douglas led all scorers with 21 points. Defensively, Halverson blocked four shots and had four steals.

Minnesota Morris (8-5, 4-2 in UMAC) heads on the road Friday for a matchup at UW-Superior.