The Murray State Racers moved into a tie for first place in the Ohio Valley Conference after an 84-63 victory over the Austin Peay Governors Thursday at the CFSB Center in Murray, Ky.
The Racers (19-5) have won six in a row and are 11-2 in the OVC. They moved into a share of first place with Belmont who was upset at Tennessee State. MSU has a Saturday 1 p.m. game at SIUE at the Vadalabene Center in Edwardsville, Illinois on Fox Sports Midwest.
Jonathan Stark led the way with 27 points on 12-of-18 from the field, while Terrell Miller, Jr., played big with 19 points and hit all three of his 3-point attempts. Ja Morant came close to his second triple-double this season with 11 points, 10 assists and eight rebounds. Byron Hawkins scored 14 points off the bench to pace the Racers to their seventh-straight home win.
MSU led from wire-to-wire and got off to a 10-2 start to the game. The Racers put together back-to-back 3-pointers from Miller and Stark to lead by 14 points with 1:44 before half. APSU trimmed it to 38-28 at the halftime intermission.
The Govs cut the Racer lead to four when it was 42-38 with 14:00 left to play, before Morant scored six-straight points to get the lead back to nine at 48-39. That was as close as Austin Peay would get. MSU pushed it back to a 16-point lead with 5:11 left on a Miller 3-pointer. MSU’s largest lead was with 1:25 left when it was 81-62.
In one of their best shooting performances of the season, the Racers used a 72 percent second half to outscore the Govs 46-35 as they hit 11-of-29 from the field and 7-of-9 from the 3-point line.
MSU also took over the lead of the Heritage Bank Battle of the Border with a win in both games of today’s doubleheader. MSU received three points for each win and now lead the bragging rights competition 16-9. The Racers play at APSU in the final game of the regular season (Feb. 24).
(From MSU Athletics)