FINAL:
MTSU 83
Murray State 67
MURFREESBORO Tenn. – The Blue Raiders welcomed The Murray State Racers to The Murphy Center for the last game before the Christmas break and heading back into conference play. According to goblueraiders.com, these two teams have split their last six meetings.
In a back and forth first half, the last six minutes was when MTSU took over. With the score sitting at 19-24, The Blue Raiders outscored Murray 20-7 to take a 44-26 lead to the locker room. After that run, The Blue Raiders never looked back, and they maintained their lead until the end of the game. Murray’s 19 turnovers compared to Middle’s 12 was the big difference in this one, as this produced a 25-10 advantage in points off turnovers for Middle. MTSU held Murray to just 67 points in a game where they pressured The Racers hard on defense and challenged their poise and discipline. Five different players for MTSU reached double digits in a game where The Blue Raiders scored 83.
Rob Perry led The Racers with 15 points. Deandre Dishman and Camryn Weston led all scorers with 17 each.
The play of the game, that you can see below, belongs to Eli Lawrence who has a good case to be on Sportscenter’s Top 10
Why not another view? #BLUEnited | @SportsCenter https://t.co/gskahf4Ndp pic.twitter.com/cGrb46XKLu
— MT Basketball (@MT_MBB) December 22, 2022
This is what MTSU Head Coach, Nick McDevitt, had to say post-game (via goblueraiders.com)
“I thought our team was ready to play early, but so was Murray, and that’s really what you want to see from your team this time of year – that your guys haven’t checked out for the Christmas break. And we weren’t. They got a couple ‘easies’ to start the game, and we went to a diamond-and-one press, and I thought that was the difference in the game.
“They got some ‘easies’ to start the second half, and we wanted to make sure we weren’t getting 3-point shooters loose early in the second half to where they could get nine points in three possessions… and they decided to do the opposite. They were cramming that thing inside quick and going on an 8-0 run in the first two minutes. We called time out and got back into our press, and I thought from there we kind of settled in.”
The Blue Raiders next game is against Charlotte, on the road, at 5:00pm on Thursday.
