A method of detecting a symbol transmitted over a communication channel in a multiple input-multiple output communication system. The method includes receiving a plurality of symbols transmitted over a communication channel of a multiple input-multiple output communication system. A sphere radius is initialized based on attributes of the communication channel. A first matrix of possible transmitted signals is defined as well as a second matrix of received symbols. The matrix of possible transmitted signals is searched using a breadth-first search (BFS). Each level of the search tree is analyzed utilizing matrix multiplication to determine selected symbols satisfying the initialized sphere radius. A maximum likelihood solution is of the transmitted symbols is derived based on the selected symbols.