Murray State
Eastern Illinois
Lady Racers clobber EIU 84-53, to visit SEMO in first round of OVC
2/28/2004 12:00:00 AM | Women's Basketball
The Murray State Lady Racers set school single-game records with 17 three-point baskets and 37 trey attempts en route to the 84-53 rout over visiting Eastern Illinois is Ohio Valley Conference action tonight. The game marked the final regular-season contest of the season for both teams.
Murray State (13-14, 9-7 OVC) also set season-highs with 84 points, 23 assists and a 31-point win margin, and tied the season-high with 31 baskets.
Senior guard Megan Fuqua, who finished with 17 points, put up 18 three-point attempts, which is also a school single-game record. She set the school single-game record for threes made earlier this season withi eight at Tennessee Tech.
The Lady Racers had game in hand early, scoring the first 18 points of the game over the first seven minutes, equaling its best scoring run of the season. MSU took a 23-2 lead when senior guard Jenny Bowden popped in a three with 11:57 left in the half for Murray State's largest first-half lead.
Eastern Illinois (8-19, 5-11 OVC) fought back, outscoring MSU 18-3 over the next eight minutes to close to within 26-20, and matched that when Meggie Eck put in a three to close the Murray State lead to 31-25 with 3:22 left in the half. The Lady Racers closed out the half outscoring the Panthers 8-2 over the last three minutes, taking a 39-27 lead at halftime.
Eastern Illinois had no offensive rebounds in the first half, although rebounding was close, with Murray State claiming 22 rebounds in the first half to EIU's 17.
In the second half, Murray State used a 10-0 run when junior guard Rebecca Remington put in a layup, senior guard Stacy Holmes sank a basket and Fuqua popped in back-to-back threes to give MSU a 54-31 lead with 14:53 left in regulation.
After EIU closed to within 19 points on an Eck jumper made it 58-39, the Lady Racers scored eight unanswered points to push the lead to 28. MSU got out to as much as a 34-point lead, 80-46, when Fuqua hit a jumper with 3:22 left in the game.
Murray State's 9-7 conference record marked only the second season with a winning league record since 1990 and the first since 2000. The nine league wins equals the combined total of the last two seasons.
"I'm very excited with having a winning record in OVC," said MSU head coach Joi Williams. "That was one of our goals, to have a winning OVC record. We took care of business at home in all but a couple of times (MSU had a 6-2 OVC home mark).
"I am proud of this team. We came out with intensity in a very emotion-filled day, with this being Senior Day. This was my first senior class as a head coach, and I couldn't ask for a better group. We had good leadership; that's what being a team is all about.
"I hope we can build on this emotion," Williams said. "Now, everyone is 0-0 going into the tournament. We need to prepare mentally, and I hope we can be cutting down some nets and getting a ring."
Murray State was led by Remington's career-high 24 points and six assists to go with five rebounds, going 6-for-8 from behind the arc. Fuqua added 17 points, while Holmes had a double-double with 16 points and a game-high 12 rebounds to go with five assists. Bowden had a career-high 12 points on 4-for-5 shooting from three-point range.
Junior forward Kaleena Miller grabbed eight rebounds for MSU.
Eastern Illinois was paced by 11 points each from Pam O'Connor, Lauren Dailey and Megan Sparks. Janelle Cazy had a team-high seven rebounds, while O'Connor and Sparks had five apiece. O'Connor and Cazy also handed out a team-high three assists each, while Cazy had a game-high three steals.
Murray State, which tied for fifth place in the OVC with Eastern Kentucky at 9-7, will take the No. 5 seed in the OVC Championship Tournament and will play at fourth-seeded Southeast Missouri (15-12, 10-6 OVC), which lost 78-75 in overtime at Tennessee-Martin tonight. Top seed Austin Peay (20-7, 14-2 OVC) will host No. 8 Morehead State (10-17, 7-9 OVC), while No. 2 Tennessee Tech (17-10, 12-4 OVC) will host No. 7 Tennessee-Martin (11-15, 8-8 OVC), and No. 3 Jacksonville State (18-9, 11-5 OVC) will host No. 6 Eastern Kentucky (13-14, 9-7 OVC).
All of these games will be played Tuesday night at 7 p.m. local time, except for the APSU-Morehead State game, which will start at 5:30 p.m. The winners of those games will advance to the semifinals on Friday, March 5, at Municipal Auditorium in Nashville, Tenn.
