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CANCUN, Mexico | A 61-42 win over Northwestern Wednesday night lifted the University of Northern Iowa men's basketball team to the Cancun Challenge championship.

It was the second dominating performance in as many nights as the Panthers moved to 6-0 on the season.

After handing Virginia Tech a 73-54 loss in Tuesday's semifinals, UNI put together a 17-0 run to take control over Northwestern (5-1) and never really looked back.

Northwestern didn't score for over nine minutes in the first half. Alex Olah's 3-pointer with 10:11 before halftime made the score 18-14, but Northwestern didn't score again until 34 seconds were left and UNI was up 31-20.

That was the halftime score and the lead got cut back to single digits for all of one possession. Seth Tuttle made a pair of free throws to put UNI back up by 11 and then answered Northwestern's final charge with an and-1 bucket to make the score 47-35 with 10:50 left.

Tuttle scored a game-high 19 points on 7 of 11 shooting. Nate Buss made 3 of 6 from behind the arc and finished with 11 points while Marvin Singleton came up with nine rebounds for the second game in a row.

Again, the Panthers picked up a major advantage at the free throw line, making 12-for-18 while the Wildcats made just 5 of 8.

UNI will put its undefeated record on the line when it returns home Sunday to take on Richmond.

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