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By DON O'BRIEN
Herald-Whig Sports Editor

Marty Bell's halftime speech Sunday has to be a keeper.

With his Quincy University men's basketball team lacking some intensity in its season-opener against Upper Iowa, Bell quickly snapped his team back into shape during the break.

"I told them 'We're not playing right," Bell said after his team turned a 33-31 halftime deficit into a 71-63 victory. "If this team is going to be successful, we have to play right. We have to keep our poise, attack the paint and take care of the basketball. We made shots, turned up the pressure and got some easy baskets out of it."

A 17-0 run to start the second half helped swing the game back in QU's favor. Upper Iowa wouldn't go away though. The Peacocks cut what was a 16-point Hawks lead down to one point with just over two minutes to play before QU made eight of nine free throws down the stretch to pull away.

"We were just flat and had a couple of guys come of the locker room with a deer-in-headlights look," Upper Iowa coach Brian Dolan said. "We were a little lethargic. We brought a couple of guys off the bench and they gave us some more energy, but we dug ourselves too big of a hole."

Upper Iowa's Jake Hughes made two free throws with 2 minutes, 4 seconds left to cut QU's lead to 62-61. Mookie Pierre followed with two free throws for the Hawks.

The Peacocks' last shot to tie came on their next possession when an uncontested Hughes 3-pointer glanced off the front of the rim.

Pierre scored in the paint on QU's next possession to push the lead to 66-61 with 58.2 seconds left. The Hawks then salted the game away at the free-throw line.

"The only thing that bothered me in the second half is that we let them off the hook," Bell said.

QU shot just 30.8 percent in the first half and had two assists against seven turnovers. The Hawks were soft on defense as Upper Iowa's Brad Burgus made three straight 3-pointers late in the half to turn a four-point QU lead into a five-point lead for the Peacocks.

"Everyone wanted to win right away," QU junior Josh Edmonds said. "We wanted to get up on them on defense. We thought if we got into them then they'd throw the ball around the gym. On offense, we wanted everything to happen so quick. We didn't do our movement or run our plays as hard as we should have."

The lackluster first half was wiped away by five good minutes to start the second. Andrew Keuker scored two baskets in the paint, while Edmonds and Mookie Pierre each made hoops off of steals as the Hawks forced Upper Iowa into five turnovers during the 17-0 run.

Pierre, thanks to a 10-for-10 effort at the foul line, finished with a team-high 16 points. Edmonds added 12, while Billy Baptist scored all 10 of his points in the second half. Tyler Burke and Andreas Coleman added nine points each off the bench.

Burgus had a game-high 17 for the Peacocks.

"We showed signs of what we can do, and we showed signs of what we can't do if we want to have a good year," Bell said.

The Hawks return to action Tuesday when they play at Missouri Western, which will be playing its season opener.

— dobrien@whig.com/221-3365