SPRINGFIELD, Mass. - North Alabama finally ran out of magical comebacks Wednesday night.

Playing at the Division II Elite Eight for the first time in 12 years, the Lions simply had no answer for unbeaten and co-No. 1 Bentley.

The Falcons frustrated the Lions all night with their motion offense as UNA saw its season end with a 102-92 loss at the MassMutual Center.

Bentley (34-0) took control late in the first half and led by 12 at halftime. The Falcons led by as many 19 in the second half. UNA (27-9), which put together second-half comebacks in all three wins at the South Regional tournament, cut the margin to eight with 3:18 remaining, but got no closer.

"Bentley is an outstanding team, and they did a good job of executing their offense as well as taking us out of what we wanted to do," UNA coach Bobby Champagne said. "Our guys fought hard and never gave up. We just were not able to get enough stops to make the kind of run we needed."

The Falcons placed six players in double figures, led by Jason Westrol's 26 points. Bentley shot 54.8 percent from the field.

"Bentley is probably a better team than we thought," said UNA senior Casey Holt, who scored 15 points before fouling out of his last game with the Lions. "We knew they shot the threes well, but we allowed them to get layups by just opening the floor for them. They are a really good team, but we didn't give them our best game."

Thomas Fraise led UNA with 25 points, followed by Kenny Johnson with 18, Holt with 15, Quinn Beckwith with 13 and Andrew Chesney with 11.

The Lions shot 48.7 percent from the field. UNA, however, hit just 7-of-9 free throws, while Bentley was 27-of-36.

"Not getting in the bonus in the second half was big," Champagne said. "We did a poor job of getting the ball inside, which is something we needed to do. Bentley's defense had us running our offense beyond the NBA 3-point line at times."

Trailing 48-36 at halftime, the Lions were unable to get the lead below double digits early in the second half. Every time UNA made a shot, the Falcons seemed to have an answer at the other end. Bentley slowly began adding to its lead and led 68-50 with 12:30 remaining.

UNA then went to its zone defense and cut the lead to 73-60 after back-to-back baskets by Fraise. But the Falcons then back consecutive 3-pointers from Quinn and Finnegan to push the lead to 81-62 with 8:15 to play.

Bentley led 85-66 when the Lions finally made a run. Chesney scored on a layup to start a 9-0 spurt that cut the lead to 85-75 after a three-point play by Fraise with 4:18 to play. After a Bentley free throw, Beckwith buried a trey to make it 86-78.

"Everybody on our bench still believed we were going to win," Fraise said. "We had been in this situation before and rallied, and we knew we could do it again. We kept fighting, but it was just too little too late."

After seeing its lead cut to eight, Bentley responded with layups from Finnegan and Quinn and two free throws from Fritsch to push the lead to 92-78 with 1:57 remaining. UNA was able to pull within eight twice in the final minutes, but would get no closer.

"It's disappointing to see it end, but this year has been a lot of fun," Holt said. "It's been a great season and a fun ride. We achieved a lot of the goals we set. Short of playing two more games, I couldn't have asked for anything better."

The lead see-sawed back and forth several times in the opening minutes and the Lions led 21-19 after a 3-pointer from Fraise.

Bentley went on a 7-0 run to go up 26-21. UNA got treys from Johnson and Beckwith along with a layup from Thomas Morris to cut the margin to 31-29. But the Falcons then began to beat the Lions down the court for layups and used a 10-0 spurt to extend their lead to 41-29. Bentley led 48-36 at halftime.

"That was a bad stretch for us late in the half," Champagne said. "We gave up some transition baskets and took some quick shots. We committed some turnovers and made some bad decisions that helped them extend the lead."

Jeff McIntyre can be reached at 740-5737 or jeff.mcintyre@timesdaily.com.