VALPARAISO, Ind. – The Indiana State men's basketball team struggled out of the gate and could never recover Saturday night, falling 70-58 to Valparaiso in the regular season finale at the Athletics-Recreation Center.
 
The Sycamores had already secured the No. 4 seed in the Missouri Valley Conference Tournament in Saint Louis coming into the game, and now knows it will play No. 5 seed Evansville in the 3 p.m. ET game on Friday, March 5. For details on tickets for Arch Madness, CLICK HERE.
 
In a role reversal from the first game of the series, ISU (14-9, 11-7 MVC) started slow out of the gate against Valpo (10-17, 7-11 MVC), scoring just 18 points and shooting just 19.2 percent (5-of-26) overall from the floor. The Sycamores made a comeback in the second half, outscoring Valparaiso 40-31 in the second stanza, but ultimately the first half deficit proved too much.

Graduate transfer Randy Miller Jr. and sophomore Tre Williams both scored 17 points on the night, with Williams adding five rebounds, four blocks, two steals, and two assists. Sophomore Jake LaRavia was the only other Sycamore to hit double-digit scoring, finishing with 12 points thanks in large part for an 8-for-8 performance from the charity stripe.
 
Valparaiso finished the night with a 54.0 percent (27-of-50) showing from the floor and 57.1 percent (8-of-14) from three, while Indiana State shot 32.7 percent (17-of-52) and just 26.1 percent (6-of-23) from downtown. Valpo also finished with more rebounds (40 to 22), more assists (14 to 10) and bench points (49 to 3), while the Sycamores made more free throws (18 to 8), had more steals (10 to 6), and forced more turnovers (19 to 10).
 
After only scoring seven points in Friday's contest, Jacob Ognacevic led Valparaiso with 19 points on 7-of-9 shooting from the floor. Three others finished the game in double-figures.

For the latest information on Sycamore Basketball, be sure to visit GoSycamores.com. You can also find the team on social media, including Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.