Coming off a tough loss against UW-LaCrosse on Wednesday, the UW-Superior men's basketball team entered Saturday's game with UW-Oshkosh realizing that another loss would put the Yellowjackets in the unwanted position of starting off the conference season at 1-4.

Fortunately, UW-Superior came through in fine fashion however, getting a game-high 24 points and 10 rebounds from senior Jake Smith (Rhinelander, Wis.) and inspiring performances from junior Ben Aalfs (Hutchinson, Minn.) and Greg Roeder (Mercer, Wis.) to down the Titans 71-58 at Mertz Mortorelli Gymnasium.

The victory upped the Yellowjackets' record to 10-4 overall and 2-3 in the WIAC while UW-Oshkosh fell to 7-7 overall and 1-4 in conference action.

Neither team was able to gain much of an advantage through the opening 10 minutes as the two sides found themselves even at 25-25 with just under 10 minutes remaining in the first half.

But the Yellowjackets would steadily begin to pull away behind 12 points from Smith, 11 from senior Marcus Helland (Baldwin, Wis.), eight points from Roeder  and seven more from Dustin Ritchie (Superior, Wis.) on the way to taking a 38-29 lead into the intermission.

In the second half, UW-Superior continued to pull away, getting 10 points from Aalfs in a little more than 10 minutes to up their advantage from 38-29 to 65-49 with just over four minutes left in the second half.

Aalfs was particularly impressive during the mid-portion of the second half, converting a three-point play, knocking down a long three-pointer and then coming up a with a key steal that resulted in two free throws that helped the Yellowjackets take a 20-point lead with under eight minutes showing on the clock.

Along with Smith's 24 points and 10 rebounds, the Yellowjackets got 15 points and nine rebounds from Helland while Aalfs finished with 12 points, all of which came in the second half.

UW-Oshkosh was paced by John Flanigan with 17 points while Greg Schrimpf added 15 points and T.J. Kellner 10.

For the game, the Yellowjackets shot an impressive 50 percent (27-of-54) from the field and limited the Titans to just 39.6 percent shooting (21-of-53) while also out-rebounding UW-Oshkosh 38-26 on the afternoon.