Gage Johnson
Editor-in-Chief
The Racers made it four straight wins on Monday, Feb. 15, dominating Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville with an offensive showcase en route to a 86-57 win.
Murray State wasted no time getting to work, jumping out to a 4-5 start offensively to take an 11-5 lead with 16:15 left in the first half.
After a post hook from sophomore forward Demond Robinson and a technical foul was issued to Robinson for jawing at the opposing team, the Racers ramped up the intensity on both ends.
A three from SIUE cut Murray State’s lead to two, but the Racers answered with a 10-0 run, lighting it up from the field with an 8-10 clip while going 5-7 from deep. This gave them a 21-9 lead with 13:04 left in the first half.
Juniors Tevin Brown and KJ Williams played a huge part in Murray State’s offensive onslaught, combining for 17 of its 23 points early.
Brown went 3-4 from deep to start the game, making it seem as though his marksmanship from past seasons is back for good. He finished the night with 18 points on 6-10 shooting, while going 6-9 from three.
After a rough start to the season, his play has played a key role in the resurgence of Murray State’s offense recently.
“Tevin’s a competitor,” said Head Coach Matt McMahon. “We talked about this some when we had Ja, he’s thin. Sometimes those guys get a label as soft or what have you, but Tevin is a warrior. Every night he guards the other team’s best offensive scorer, makes multiple effort plays and took a big charge [tonight].”
Along with a near double-double by halftime from Williams, Murray State walked into the locker room with a 46-30 lead.
The Racers came out of the locker room and added onto their lead with a 7-0 run, taking a 58-35 lead four minutes into the half.
This was all Murray State needed, as SIUE couldn’t muster enough offense to create a comeback, ultimately giving the Racers an 86-57 win.
Murray State shot 53.4% from the field, marking the fifth time in six games that they had shot over 50% from the field.
Williams played a big part in that with another big double-double, earning 28 points on 10-17 shooting, while going 3-3 from deep and grabbing 14 rebounds.
“He’s been awesome,” McMahon said. “If you look at these last 11 games, he’s been incredibly consistent, he’s scoring the ball at a high level in the post, he’s working hard without the basketball and clearly shooting it well from behind the arc.”
Williams’ starting post counterpart sophomore forward Demond Robinson has strung together a bunch of solid games, finishing with 10 points on 4-5 shooting while grabbing seven rebounds against the Cougars.
Robinson said he just wants to bring a toughness and a spark to the team that nobody else can bring in order to help the team win.
“My role is to rebound, play hard and just be a physical big, ” Robinson said. “My role is really to bang, bring a lot of power and enthusiasm to the team. Just playing as hard as I can and when you do that, a lot of people will come around so that opens up the floor a lot too.”
Defensively Murray State has continued to improve on its three-point defense over the past few weeks. It’s something that McMahon and company have prided themselves on for years and it showed against SIUE.
“Some of it is schematic if you look at how we’ve played the last year, but then a lot of it ultimately comes down to ultimate effort from everybody,” McMahon said. “Not just the guy who’s guarding the ball, or the guy who’s defending the ball screen, [but] trying to defend as a team.”
The win moves the Racers to 12-9 overall, while sitting at 9-7 in OVC play. With the four-game winning streak under their belt, Robinson feels as though everything is falling into place for Murray State.
“I feel as if we’re doing everything we need to to actually win,” Robinson said. “Our bigs are banging, our guards are actually shooting the ball and driving to the hole. We’re creating space for them so they can have shooting range and driving angles… I feel like we’re doing a lot of things right and we’re moving in the right direction.”
With the current weather, the team is planning to leave in the coming days and hopefully still compete in front of a home crowd against Eastern Illinois University.
“We’ll get together and evaluate the travel, tomorrow is an off day for us anyway,” McMahon said. “The guys will need the rest coming off these three games in four days and then we’ll get right back to work preparing for Eastern Illinois on Thursday.”
The Racers will take on EIU at 7:30 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 18, at the CFSB Center barring any weather conditions or COVID protocol precautions.
