Gage Johnson
Editor-in-chief
A familiar foe named turnovers defeated the Racers once again, as 23 committed turnovers led to their downfall against EIU.
The unforced errors that have been an Achilles’ heel for Murray State to start the season left the Racers at 0-5 on the road, falling to the Panthers 74-68.
Murray State came out of the gates looking to bounce back from its home OVC loss to Morehead State, doing so with an efficient start offensively.
Starting out 5-6 from the field— with two of those shots coming from beyond the arc courtesy of sophomore guard DaQuan Smith after being inserted into the starting lineup for the first time this season— the Racers jumped out to an early 12-5 lead.
Smith was a key part of their offense early on, as he and junior forward KJ Williams combined for 11 of Murray State’s first 13 points.
Smith came into the season 2-16 from three, but finished with nine points on 3-5 shooting from beyond the arc.
“I felt like we needed to get DaQuan’s toughness on the floor,” said Head Coach Matt McMahon. “His ability to defend and I know he hadn’t shot it well early this year, but as I’ve told him when you throw together an 0-1, an 0-3 and an 0-1, before you know it you’re shooting 20%. I thought he gave us a great lift.”
The Racers carried momentum throughout the rest of the half, shooting lights out from deep with a 7-11 clip, along with a team-leading 13 points off the bench from sophomore guard Chico Carter Jr.
However, Murray State held just a 38-33 lead going into the locker room, thanks to 4-10 shooting from three for EIU as well as nine Racer turnovers.
Murray State came out of the locker room with a lot of urgency and looked as if they were ready to put EIU away for its first road win on the season.
A 13-0 run had the Racers up 51-38 with 15:39 left in the second half, but they toyed with a double-digit lead for much of the second half, until turnovers came back to bite them once again.
“The last 10 minutes of the game, they took over and absolutely dominated us at the defensive end of the floor,” McMahon said. “They took the ball when they wanted to take it and that led to some easy layups in transition for them.”
A barrage of turnovers led to a 10-0 run for the Panthers, giving them a 66-64 lead for their first lead since 5-3.
These turnovers continued to turn into points for EIU and led to the Racers blowing a 13-point lead and falling to the Panthers 74-68 for their fifth road loss of the season.
The 23 turnovers for Murray State led to 28 points off of turnovers for EIU, leaving the Racers still trying to clean up their offensive execution in order to get back in the win column.
“It’s my responsibility to get that fixed,” McMahon said. “We haven’t been able to do so. I thought [what] really hurt us [was] the foul trouble of KJ. When he was on the floor we were able to get the ball inside to him and that led to more efficient offense from us… But we have to reevaluate and see if there’s something we can do differently offensively that will enable us to get more shots at the basket versus turnovers that lead to layups for the other team.”
Nearly every single Racer who played had at least one turnover and junior guard Tevin Brown led the team with six turnovers. His three-point shooting struggles also continued, as he was 1-8 from deep. He entered the game shooting at 28% clip from beyond the arc.
“I hate it for Tevin,” McMahon said. “I know he’s crushed right now and disappointed with the way he played, but I’m always going to roll with Tevin Brown. I believe in him. I believe in all of our players.”
For the Panthers, senior guard Josiah Wallace caught fire in the second half, scoring 12 points to finish with 18 points on 6-11 shooting from the field and 6-6 shooting from the charity stripe.
“He’s just a great player,” McMahon said. “I thought he was well-defended on many of his shots. He hit some tough contested 17 to 19-footers with a hand in his face. I know we had to foul him late some to add to his total, but I thought those were really key stretches. We kept that lead around six to 10 and we could never really put them away. Wallace or Johnson would respond with a tough shot and then ultimately you saw the flurry of turnovers that led to layups that cost us the game.”
The road loss moves the Racers to 4-6 overall, 1-4 in OVC play and marks their fourth straight loss.
“We’re not happy with where we’re at,” McMahon said. “I promise you there’s no one more disappointed than those people sitting in that locker room right now. But we’ve gotta stick together. That’s the only way I know how to do it. There’s nothing really to yell or scream about. We’ve gotta stick together as a group.”
McMahon said he believes his coaching staff and players will undoubtedly find a way to handle this adversity early on in the season and come together as a team.
Murray State will continue its three-game road trip in a game against SEMO on Thursday, Jan. 14, at 8 p.m. after their matchup against SIUE was postponed. This gives the Racers a week of practice that McMahon said they must take advantage of.
“I think it’s a seven-day period where we need to take advantage of the time to get in the gym and clearly work on fundamentals, offensive execution and building confidence for our team,” McMahon said. “We got 15 games left to play in our league. Obviously [we’re] incredibly disappointed with where we’re at right now, but somehow we’ve gotta find a way to not let this snowball continue to roll downhill.”
