Missouri Valley Basketball: Missouri State, Southern Illinois fall in MTE matchups

A bad thing happened on the way to three Missouri Valley Conference multi-team event victories. Both Illinois State and Southern Illinois enjoyed sizeable leads and then lost those leads and their games. MTE disappointments were real.

Southern Illinois was cruising during its Gulf Coast Showcase opening round game. The Salukis led Louisiana Tech (5-0) by eight points with 3:52 to play, but the Bulldogs went on a 12-4 finish to force overtime and then dominated the extra session. 85-79 was the overtime final.

The Salukis (2-4) made just one field goal the final 3:52 of regulation and three field goals during the overtime. 

Prior to the game, SIU announced that 14-point-per-game scorer Elijah Elliott is out for the season with a knee injury. In his absence, nine Salukis scored points and sophomore Kennard Davis led the team with 16 points and ten rebounds. 

SIU’s second round opponent is Eastern Kentucky. Game time is set for 11:00 a.m. and can be seen on FloCollege.com.

It was the same story for Illinois State at the Paradise Jam. The Redbirds led George Washington by 15 points with under 13:00 to play and led by ten mid-way through the second half. GW finished the game outscoring Illinois State 35-17 through the game’s final ten minutes. 

Illinois State (4-3) lost its three-point shooting touch, making just four of 18 long distance attempts and dropped two of three Paradise Jam games. Chase Walker (18 points), Johnny Kinziger (16) and Dalton Banks (13) led the Redbirds’ offense who finished sixth at the Paradise Jam.

The script was different for Missouri State at the Cayman Islands Classic. The Bears trailed by eleven points with 11:41 to play and Cuonzo Martin’s team stormed back to take the lead with 1:39 to play. With :29 left the Bears led by three points. A Donald Hand triple sent the game into overtime. 

Missouri State scored the first six points of the extra period only to fall 76-74 to Boston College (5-1). In an eerily similar chain of events, the Bears led by by one point with 14 seconds left, only to see a three-pointer by Elijah Strong with four seconds left to seal the Bears’ (4-2) fate. 

Dez White carried the MSU offense with 25 points and Jalen Hampton recorded a 15-point, ten rebound double-double. The Bears play South Dakota State for third place in the Cayman Islands Classic. Game time on FloCollege.com is set for 4:00 p.m.

Missouri Valley Conference teams have won nine of 15 MTE games, with Bradley and Drake winning their MTEs. Belmont joins in the MTE action on Tuesday. The Bruins (4-1) face Loyola Marymount (1-3) at the Cancun Challenge. The 7:30 p.m. tip can be seen on CBS Sports Network.