The Associated Press

MUNCIE, Ind. - Chris Williams and Matt McCollom combined for 59 points Sunday as Ball State beat Miami 78-70.

McCollom hit a pair of jumpers and Williams hit a three-point field goal in the opening minutes of the second half as Ball State's lead reached 18 points at 52-34 with 13:54 left.

The RedHawks (9-11, 7-4 Mid-American Conference) responded with a 19-8 run of its own and tied the game at 62 with seven minutes to play. The run was cut short when Echols hit a baseline jumper to give the Cardinals (10-11, 5-6 MAC) a 64-62 lead.

Williams and McCollom scored 24 of Ball State's first 28 points as the Cardinals rolled to a 28-14 lead midway through the first half.

A pair of free throws from Williams with 3:53 left in the half gave Ball State a 34-18 lead, while a jumper from Cameron Echols pushed the Cardinals' lead to 17 points at 36-19 seconds later.

Danny Horace led the Redhawks with 22 points, Josh Hausfeld had 18, and Juby Johnson added 15.

Williams finished with 39 points and McCollom scored 20. Echols finished with 10 points and 11 rebounds.

Miami	M	FG	Att	FT	Att	R	A	F	TO	TP
Reed	16	1	2	3	4	2	3	1	1	5
Horace	40	6	10	10	11	9	2	1	3	22
Hausfeld	36	7	11	0	0	3	1	5	2	18
Mason	32	2	7	0	3	6	3	5	3	4
Johnson	26	5	11	3	3	0	0	2	0	15
Jameson	11	0	1	0	0	1	0	1	0	0
Drake	7	0	0	2	2	0	0	2	1	2
Seals	28	2	4	0	0	2	8	2	1	4
Schenke	3	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Hatcher	1	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0
Totals	200	23	46	18	23	24	17	19	11	70

Team rebounds: 1.

Ball State	M	FG	Att	FT	Att	R	A	F	TO	TP
Owens	37	1	9	2	2	7	1	1	4	4
Echols	33	5	8	0	0	11	0	2	1	10
Cates	15	0	2	0	0	2	0	5	0	0
McCollom	32	5	8	8	10	1	2	4	2	20
Williams	39	11	21	14	15	2	5	0	0	39
Cox	8	0	0	0	0	0	0	1	0	0
Bennett	24	2	2	1	2	4	0	1	2	5
Howland	120	0	0	0	2	0	0	5	0	0
Totals	200	24	50	25	29	32	8	19	9	78

Team rebounds: 3.

Miami	27	43	-70
Ball State	38	40	-78

Attendance-6,508. 3-point goals-Miami 6-15 (Reed 0-1, Horace 0-1, Hausfeld 4-6, Mason 0-1, Johnson 2-6); Ball State 5-15 (Owens 0-2, McCollom 2-4, Williams 3-9). Technical fouls-Miami, Team; Ball State, Team. Officials-Lickliter, Carstensen, Foote.

Mid-American Conference roundup

No one questions that Kent State has the best talent in the Mid-American Conference. But on Saturday, Northern Illinois had the better team.

Todd Peterson came off the bench to score 17 points and sub Anthony Maestranzi hit two free throws with 13 seconds left as Northern Illinois toppled Kent State 67-61.

"We try to sell our team on winning every four minutes," Northern Illinois coach Rob Judson said. "We've been fortunate. We've played hard and tried to establish our defense on the road and make our free throws. That's what we did down the stretch."

There were several reasons lurking behind the victory. First, the Huskies shot 57 percent from the field while holding Kent State to a season-low 38 percent. The Huskies also held Antonio Gates to 12 points - 10 under his average. And the Huskies' bench outscored Kent State's substitutes 27-7.

Peterson hit 5-of-10 3-point attempts and led the Huskies (11-9, 8-3) with seven rebounds. Eugene Bates added 14 points and Marcus Smallwood had 12.

"We got beat off the dribble all game," Kent coach Jim Christian said. "They have very good perimeter drivers and they took advantage of that."

Eric Haut led the Golden Flashes (17-3, 10-2) with 22 points and Anthony Wilkins had 15 points.

A Haut 3-pointer brought the Golden Flashes to 60-58 with 1:53 remaining, but Bates made a jumper with 38 seconds left and Smallwood added a free throw with 20 seconds on the clock.

A Wilkins basket with 16 seconds remaining cut Northern Illinois' lead to 63-61, but Maestranzi was fouled and made both free throws. Smith later added two foul shots.

"This was not one of our higher energy games," Christian said. "We played two games in less than 48 hours and that's tough to do."

Elsewhere around the MAC, Brandon Hunter had 16 points to go with his 20 rebounds and Steve Esterkamp led with 17 points as Ohio beat Buffalo 61-49; Steve Pettyjohn and Markus Austin each had 18 points as Eastern Michigan beat Toledo 76-72; Ronald Blackshear scored 22 points, including the last four of the game, to lift Marshall past Bowling Green 56-54; and Chris Kaman scored 28 points and had 12 rebounds as Central Michigan outscored Akron 99-92.

In the sloppy win over Buffalo, Hunter had almost half of the 41 rebounds for Ohio (7-11, 4-6), but made only 8-of-20 free throws.

Buffalo (3-16, 0-10) shot just 29.8 percent from the field and never led, trailing by as many as 19 points in the second half.

"That game won't get too many artistic points," Ohio coach Tim O'Shea said. "I thought Brandon was tremendous. Except for free throw shooting he's having a player of the year type year. I hope we get enough wins to get him that honor. He's been on an absolute tear."

In its home game against Toledo, Eastern (10-9, 4-6) took its biggest lead of the game at 72-64 with 2:45 remaining on a 3-pointer by Michael Ross.

Toledo (3-7, 9-11) cut the lead to 75-72 with 17.6 seconds left on a 3-pointer by Keith Triplett, but a free throw by Austin with 12.7 seconds remaining rounded out the scoring.

Ross had 15 points and Ryan Prillman added 14 points for the Eagles.

Four players scored in double figures for Toledo, led by Triplett's 19 points.

Bowling Green led Marshall (10-10, 6-6) 53-45 with five minutes remaining after two Kevin Netter free throws, but the Falcons scored just one point the rest of the way.

Marshall's Blackshear hit the go-ahead basket with 22 seconds left. Bowling Green's Ron Lewis missed a 3-pointer at the final buzzer.

Lewis finished with 18 points for Bowling Green (10-10, 6-6).

Central Michigan (14-5, 7-3) led by as many as 21 points before coasting to the seven-point win over Akron (10-10, 5-6).

Mike Manciel added 23 points and J.R. Wallace had 19 for Central, which ruined the spectacular shooting night of Akron's Derrick Tarver. Tarver scored 43 points - hitting 17-of-21 free throws.