Chris Douglas-Roberts and Jeremy Hunt combined to score 40 points as sixth-ranked Memphis held off upset-minded UTEP, 78-67, before a crowd of 11,066 on Thursday at the Don Haskins Center.

The Tigers (26-3, 15-0 C-USA) posted their 18th consecutive victory in the first meeting between the schools in El Paso since 1977.

The Miners (14-15, 6-9 C-USA) trailed 57-56 with 10:14 remaining and 59-58 with 7:41 to play, missing four shots that could have given them the lead during that stretch.

After UTEP's Maurice Thomas missed a jumper with 7:10 left, Douglas-Roberts and Hunt went on a personal 9-0 run to extend the Tigers' lead to 68-58 with 5:13 to go.

UTEP drew within 68-63 with 3:49 remaining on two free throws by Stefon Jackson. Kevin Henderson, playing in his final home game for the Miners, misfired on a three-point attempt with 2:25 to play that could have closed the gap to two points.

Douglas-Roberts nailed a jumper at the 1:57 mark and Robert Dozier hit a foul shot with 1:34 to go to widen Memphis' margin to 71-63, and the closest UTEP could get the rest of the way was seven points.

"It was a good game," UTEP coach Tony Barbee said. "I'm disappointed that we didn't win. Our guys played hard. It's not the talent that makes Memphis so good, it's the intensity that they bring to everything that they do. I told our guys, let's go to Houston [on Saturday] and play with the same emotion, passion and enthusiasm that we had tonight. And let's bring it to the conference tournament [next week in Memphis] becuase if we do that, anything can happen."

Douglas-Roberts scored 21 points, and Hunt had 12 of his 19 in the second half for the Tigers. Hunt buried four three-pointers in the game.

UTEP trailed 26-15 with nine minutes left in the first half, but rallied to knot the contest at 36 with 58 seconds to go in the opening period. The Miners trailed 40-36 at the break.

Jackson led UTEP with 19 points and 12 rebounds. Jeremy Sampson added 14 points -- making four three-pointers -- and Marvin Kilgore had 12.

UTEP outshot Memphis 47 percent to 41 percent, but the Mineirs committed 21 turnovers and were outrebounded 47-33.

"We shot the ball well, and when we've done that we've been pretty good this season," Barbee said. "We didn't rebound well, and we didn't take care of the basketball. They had 17 more field goal attempts than us, which is something that we try to do."

The Miners will conclude the regular season at Houston on Saturday. The game will be televised in El Paso on Time Warner Cable MetroSports Southwest Channel 24 beginning at 6 p.m. MST.