Racers Hammer Out 71-68 Win At Austin Peay

Saturday, January 12

Clarksville, Tenn.

7:30 p.m.

Murray State

12-4 (3-1)

Austin Peay

5-13 (1-3)

Murray State

Austin Peay

Photo by: Tab Brockman

1/12/2013 10:20:00 PM | Men's Basketball

Box Score

Box Score I Box Score(PDF)

The Murray State Racers scored their fourth straight win at Austin Peay Saturday in a 71-68 victory at the Dunn Center in Clarksville, Tenn.

Led by Isaiah Canaan's 26 points and a double-double from Ed Daniel of 21 points and 13 rebounds, the Racers (12-4) moved their mark in the Ohio Valley Conference to 3-1.

Trailing by as many as five in the first half, MSU closed the opening 20 minutes with a 7-1 run to lead 31-29.

After APSU took a 41-39 lead at the 11:58 mark of the second half, the Racers went in front 44-41 on a three-point play from Canaan with 10:37 remaining. MSU took the lead again at the 9:22 mark when Canaan hit his fourth three-point basket of the day for a 47-45 lead.

The Governors were ahead again by one point when Daniel scored a three-point play with 6:07 remaining to give MSU the lead for good.

But bringing home the win wasn't easy for MSU, as Travis Beltran kept APSU in the game with two banked in threes in the final seconds. The last was a four point play after he was fouled that made it a 70-68 game with 11.8 remaining. Jeffery Moss made one free throw to make it a three point lead with 4.8 left and APSU wasn't able to get a possible tying three off.

The game featured nine tied scores and 13 lead changes.

MSU had a 40-31 edge in rebounding.

Game Notes
The Racers have now won four straight games on APSU's home court since their last loss here on Feb. 4, 2009. The four-game streak at APSU marks only the second since the first meeting between the the two since the Govs joined the OVC in 1964. Under Coach Cal Luther, the Racers also had four straight wins at APSU from 1968-71.

MSU leads the all-time series with APSU 73-41.

The second game of the season series for the Racers and Govs will be at the CFSB Center in Murray, Ky. (Feb. 2) and will air on ESPNU in a noon tip.

Isaiah Canaan's 26 points tonight moved him closer to becoming the sixth member of the MSU 2000-Point Club and the 17^th player to reach the magic mark in the OVC. He moved past Garrett Beshear (1950-53) for ninth place on the MSU all-time scoring list now with 1,724 points. Eighth place on the list is Frank Allen (1989-93) who has 1,811 points.

Canaan also extended his school-record streak of making a three-point basket to 25 straight games.

Daniel recorded his ninth double-double of the season which ranks him among the best in NCAA D-I.

MSU returns home next week for a pair of games on their home court at the CFSB Center in Murray, Ky. MSU hosts Eastern Illinois Thursday at 7 p.m. and Saturday the Racers host SIUE at 7:30 p.m. Both games can be heard over the air on WFGE 103.7 FM and streaming online audio at Froggy103.com and GoRacers.com. The OVC Digital Network will have streaming video.