First Place Racers Defeat Bradley – Push Win Streak to 9

Sunday, January 4

Murray, Ky.

4 p.m.

Murray State

13-3,5-0MVC

Bradley

10-6,3-2MVC

Bradley

Murray St.

Photo by: David Eaton-Murray State Athletics

First Place Racers Defeat Bradley – Push Win Streak to 9

1/4/2026 7:28:00 PM | Men's Basketball

Box Score Box Score (PDF)

MSU moved to 5-0 in the MVC with their 10th straight home win at the CFSB Center

Murray State Racers hit 13 3-pointers and pushed their winning streak to eight and home streak to 10 with an 86-66 win on Sunday over the Bradley Braves at the CFSB Center in Murray, Kentucky.

The Racers (13-3 UPDATE) remained undefeated in the Missouri Valley Conference at 5-0 with a week ahead that sees them travel to Evansville Wednesday and come back to Murray Saturday (Jan. 10) to face Valparaiso.

Javon Jackson led the Racers with 20 points for his sixth game of at least 20 this season, while Mathis Courbon scored a career-high 16 points on 4-of-5 shooting from the 3-point line. Fred King added 11 points and MSU got 10 points from JJ Traynor.

By the time the game reached the under-8 timeout, the Racers had a 28-13 lead on 67 percent shooting, while holding the Braves to 21 percent.

The Racers saw Brock Vice, Layne Taylor, Mason Miller, Jackson and Traynor hit six threes in the final 7:15 to give the Racers their best first half of the season in a 50-32 lead at the intermission.

Bradley never got any closer than 14 points in the second half.

Game Notes

An announced crowd of 5,165 today gave the Racers' their largest this season in nine home games and a national audience on ESPN2 watched it.
The Racers snap a four-game losing skid to the Braves and are now 5-2 at home all-time vs Bradley and 3-4 overall in MVC games.
MSU's 45-33 win in rebound margin by 12 is their season-high, besting the six they had vs Drake.
The Racers' best rebound margin in four seasons in The Valley is 16 and accomplished twice.
The first was in their inaugural season in 2022-23 when they outrebounded UIC 40-24 (01-14-2023) and the other was a 43-27 edge on Indiana State (02-25-25).
The Racers did an outstanding job defending MVC leading scorer, Jaquan Johnson in limiting him to four points on 2-of-12 from the field.
MSU had perhaps their best defensive performance of the season in guarding without fouling with 14, just one off the 13 fouls they had against Bellarmine (Dec. 6).
MSU held Bradley to 33 percent shooting (23-of-70), their best defensive performance this season in five MVC games.
MSU held Bradley to 17-of-52 from 2-point range (.326).
MSU's 10-of-17 from the 3-point line was their best first half of the season in besting the eight threes they had vs Akron (Dec. 3) in Las Vegas.
MSU ended the day 13-of-30 from the 3-point line (.433).
MSU had seven different players connect on a 3-pointer.
Mason Miller extended his consecutive games streak of making a 3-pointer to 10.
Javon Jackson's 20-point performance was his six of 20 or more this season and he has scored in double-figures in all but two of the 16 games this season.
MSU's 9-game win streak is the best currently in the MVC.
All 13 of MSU's wins this season have included the Racers getting to the 80-point mark first.
When MSU scores 80 points this season, they are 13-2 with their only losses coming to SMU and Middle Tennessee.
MSU entered the day tops in The Valley in bench points (34.6), scoring offense (88.4), free throw attempts (25.1) and made free throws (19.1).
26^th in NCAA DI, MSU has 32 bench points today, led by Mathis Courbon's 14 points.

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