CHARLOTTE, North Carolina (February 4, 2017) – Despite a season-high tying 27 points from Donte McGill and 16 points from Elmo Stephen the FIU men's basketball team could not overcome a dominant offensive performance from Charlotte's Austin Ajukwa who scored 30 points and Jon Davis who netted 26 as the 49ers handed the Panthers a 95-80 defeat at Halton Arena Saturday night.

The loss drops the Panthers to 5-18 on the year and 1-9 in Conference USA while Charlotte improves to 11-11 on the season and 5-6 in league play.

In addition to McGill and Stephen, Eric Nottage added 14 points, however, the rest of the FIU roster scored just 23 points on the night. The Panthers shot 49.2 percent (31-of-63) from the field, yet made only four of its 15 shots from behind the three-point arc for 26.7 percent.

As for Charlotte, two other 49ers – Braxton Ogbueze (17 points) and Adrien White (16 points) – joined Ajukwa and Davis netting double figures, while the team shot 59.6 percent (34-of-57) from the floor, including 48.8 percent (11-of-23) from behind the three-point arc, and a near-perfect 94.1 percent (16-of-17 from the free-throw line.

FIU forced Charlotte into 12 turnovers on the night which led to a 20-6 points off turnover advantage for the Blue and Gold.

The Panthers took advantage of sloppy Charlotte play at the beginning of the game, forcing the 49ers into three turnovers in the first minute and 10 seconds of the contest, and taking a fast 4-0 lead on a McGill layup and an Anthony Boswell jumper.

Charlotte, however, regrouped and took the lead for the remainder of the game. The Panthers stayed close until the 49ers used a 9-0 run over a two-plus minute stretch to take a 31-22 lead with 5:53 left in the half.

Charlotte eventually took a 10-point, 43-33 lead into the locker room at the break.

The 49ers pushed their lead to 13 points, 50-37, with 17:26 left in the game before FIU staged its own surge – that included a 12-2 run – to cut the Charlotte to one, 53-52, on a Boswell jumper with 13:35 left on the clock.

After the 49ers got their advantage back to double-digits the Panthers got to within seven, 70-63, on a Stephen layup with seven minutes left, however that was as close as FIU got the rest of the night.

FIU will return home on Feb. 9 to take on Rice (7 p.m.) and North Texas on Feb. 11 (7 p.m.).

Fans are encouraged to follow @FIUHoops on Twitter, and "Like" FIU men's basketball on Facebook (www.Facebook.com/FIUMensBBall) for the latest Panther basketball news.

Follow all of FIU's 18 athletic teams on Google+ (FIU Athletics), Twitter (@FIUAthletics), Facebook (Facebook.com/FIUSports), YouTube (FIUPanthers), and Instagram (FIUathletics).

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About FIU Athletics: FIU Athletics is home to more than 400 student-athletes in 18 different sports. Athletic events are played in seven different venues on FIU's campuses (Modesto A. Maidique and Biscayne Bay), including FIU Arena and at the FIU Football Stadium.
 
About FIU: Florida International University is recognized as a Carnegie engaged university. Its colleges and schools offer more than 180 bachelor¹s, master¹s and doctoral programs in fields such as engineering, international relations, architecture, law and medicine. As one of South Florida's anchor institutions, FIU is Worlds Ahead in its local and global engagement, finding solutions to the most challenging problems of our time. FIU emphasizes research as a major component of its mission. FIU has awarded 200,000 degrees and enrolls 50,000 students in two campuses and three centers including FIU Downtown on Brickell and the Miami Beach Urban Studios. FIU is a member of Conference USA and has 400 student-athletes participating in 18 sports. For more information about FIU, visit http://www.fiu.edu/.