CONWAY, Ark. – McNeese rolled off 20 straight second half points and Keelan Garrett broke out of his slump with 25 points to help lead the Cowboys to a 77-60 win over Central Arkansas in the team's final road game of the regular season here Tuesday night.
 
Garrett entered the game having made just 3 of 25 shots in the last three games and 1 of 16 from 3-point range. He knocked down 10 of 16 on Tuesday night, including 5 of 9 from long range to finish one point off his career high.
 
The win moved the Cowboys to 11-15 overall and 5-10 in Southland Conference play. UCA fell to 1-24 on the season and 1-13 in the league.
 
McNeese returns home to play its final three games beginning Saturday at 3:05 against Nicholls State.
 
Garrett was one of four Cowboys to score in double-digits – the first time that's happened since a 68-61 win over UNO on Jan. 31. Kevin Hardy added 16 points to go along with a career-high eight steals – one off the school single-game record – and six rebounds. Desharick Guidry recorded his 19^th double-double of the season with 13 points and 11 rebounds and Jamaya Burr added 12 points with nine assists and six rebounds.
 
"This was a great effort by everyone tonight," said head coach Dave Simmons. "I told the kids coming in that we cannot overlook them (UCA) just because of their record. They have some players that can really play. You look at the games they've played here (Farris Center), for the exception of Stephen F. Austin and Sam Houston State, they have been close games.
 
"I'm very proud of the kids. This was one of our better performances of the season."
 
McNeese led 38-33 at the half but UCA came out and scored the first four points of the second half to cut the lead to 1 at 38-37. What followed was the longest scoring run of the season for the Cowboys – 20 straight.
 
A total of 16 of those 20 points were on fast break chances as Hardy and Burr scored six each during that run. The first two buckets were jumpers by Guidry and Garrett but the rest came on layups and eight of the points came off of turnovers. McNeese went from leading 38-37 with 19:09 to play to going up 58-37 at the 13:29 mark.
 
UCA bounced back and scored eight straight to cut a 64-43 lead to 64-51 behind Mathieu Kamba who scored all eight of the points.
 
After a McNeese timeout, Garrett heated up from the far side baseline and knocked down three straight 3s from the same spot to help build the lead back to 22 at 75-53 with 4:34 to play. UCA scored the final seven points as the Cowboys played to run out the clock.
 
McNeese connected on 52.5 percent of its shots (32 of 61) for the game and was 16 of 30 for 53.3 percent in the second half. UCA hit 24 of 59 for 40.7 percent. Both teams made six three-pointers and UCA held a 34-33 advantage on the boards.
 
The Cowboys scored 26 fast break points in the game and had 31 points off of 18 UCA turnovers.
 
Kamba led the Bears with 14 points while Jordan Howard scored 13.