HONOLULU – Senior forward Tyler Brimhall scored a season-high 20 points for Alaska Anchorage but his team could not overcome an early deficit Friday as No. 21 Southeastern Oklahoma State earned an 88-68 men's basketball victory in the D2 Power Invitational at the Hawaii Convention Center.

The Seawolves (8-4) also got 13 points from sophomore guard Tobin Karlberg as they fell for the second straight night to a Great American Conference program.

Meanwhile, the Savage Storm (7-2) benefitted from a monster game from starting forward Kevin Buckingham, who scored 46 points on 19-of-31 shooting, while tying UAA's DeAndre Osuigwe for a game-high eight rebounds.

"We ran into an extremely good team that was coming off a tough loss and came out very focused. Between their hot start and our personnel issues, it was not going to be our night," said UAA head coach Rusty Osborne, whose team was missing guard Jack Macdonald (illness) and saw guard Tyrus Hosley leave the game with an injury midway through the first half. "Despite the loss, it was good to see Tyler have a nice offensive performance, and we showed a lot of fight after being down so big early. We'll regroup tonight and come back for an important West Region game tomorrow."

After surrendering a 17-point halftime lead and losing in overtime to Simon Fraser the previous evening, Southeastern jumped to a 9-0 advantage and led 27-8 midway through the opening half. The GAC preseason favorites pushed their largest advantage to 52-25, and led by at least 15 points the rest of the way.

A first team All-GNAC performer as a junior, Brimhall had his best offensive effort of this season, nailing 7 of 14 shots, including 5 of 11 from long range, along with three assists, five rebounds and two blocks. Karlberg shot 5 of 11 from the field despite playing through a deep thigh contusion suffered in Thursday's loss to Arkansas Monticello, while senior forward Niko Bevens and junior center Oggie Pantovic reached double figures with 11 and 10 points, respectively.

UAA finishes its Honolulu trip and regular-season non-conference schedule Saturday against Hawaii-Hilo at 4:30 p.m. at the Convention Center.