A long 3-pointer from Travis Berry sparked an 8-2 run and eliminated the Shawnee State University men's basketball team from the first round of the Mid-South Conference tournament on Monday.

The University of Virginia-Wise defeated SSU 71-66 to advance to the next round, and will play Georgetown on Saturday.

Berry finished the game with 31 points, including his team's final eight points.

"He was the man tonight," Cavaliers Coach Lee Clark said of Berry. "Right before he took that 3-point shot, he looked over at us on the bench, and we nodded and gave him the green light."

Berry's shot came with 2:49 to play in the second half and took the lead away from the Bears (4-14.)

"That kind of shot is not new to him," Shawnee Coach Jeff Hamilton said. "We let him shoot that shot, then we come down and miss free throws."

The Bears had battled back from an eight-point deficit.

Mark Bryant canned a runner, then countered that with a bucket from an offensive rebound.

Shawnee eventually tied the game 63-63 when Tyler Boyles drained a 3-pointer with 3:58 to play in the game.

That's when Berry took over and whipped off eight points for the Cavaliers.

"We had our chances," Hamilton said. "We didn't execute down the stretch. We missed open guys and we missed some block outs."

Boyles led the Bears with 18 points while Tyler Morgan and Mark Bryant each had 11 points in the loss.

Keelyn Franklin added 10 points for SSU.

"When you look at the stats, Berry scored nearly half their points," Hamilton said. "He was everywhere."

UVW —  39 32 — 71

SSU — 37 29 — 66

UVW — Berry 10 7 31, Smith 1 0 2, Gaskins 4 0 8, Perry 3 0 6, Jordan 4 1 9, Eligwe 1 2 5, Wright 3 0 6, Phillips 2 0 4.

SSU — Franklin 4 1 10, Bryant 4 3 11, Harrison 3 0 7, Boyles 6 2 18, Morgan 4 3 11, Laster 1 0 3, Devlin 1 0 2, Leslie 2 0 4.

3-pointers — UVA 5 (Berry 4, Eligwe) SSU 7 (Boyles 4, Laster, Harrison, Franklin.)