Nov. 17, 2010
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NORMAL, Ill. -
Illinois State guard Justin Clark scored 12 of his game-high 20 points in the second half, as Illinois State saw a large halftime lead dwindle to single digits before holding on for a 73-68 win over Ohio Valley Conference foe Tennessee State Wednesday night on Doug Collins Court at Redbird Arena.
With the win, the Redbirds (2-0) started the season with back-to-back wins for the fourth season in a row under head coach Tim Jankovich and extended the their winning streak to 25 straight wins against members of the OVC, including a 7-0 record under Jankovich. Clark finished the game 7-of-14 from the field, including a 6-for-12 effort from three-point range, to finish with a career-high 20 points. Nine Redbirds scored in the game, with Jackie Carmichael adding 11 points and seven rebounds and Tony Lewis and Austin Hill chipping in eight points each. The Tigers had five players score in double figures, led by Patrick Miller and Wil Peters with 14 points each.
Illinois State jumped out to a 7-0 lead, courtesy of a pair of baskets from Carmichael and a three-pointer from Clark, before Kenny Moore connected from long distance to cut the ISU lead to 7-3 at the 15:52 mark. The Redbirds would extend that lead to 18-8 with 11:14 left in the first half after a tip-in layup from Lewis and five-straight points from Hill.
After a fastbreak layup by Tennessee State's Jacquan Nobles cut the lead to eight after the second media timeout, a pair of three-pointers from Anthony Cousin, his first two in a Redbird uniform, widened the lead to 24-10 with just over nine minutes remaining in the half. The Tigers used a 7-2 run, capped by a jumper from Moore, to cut the lead to single digits at 26-17 with just over seven minutes remaining. However, the Redbirds answered back with a 12-3 run to take its largest lead of the half at 38-20 after another three-pointer by Clark.
The two teams traded baskets for the remainder of the half and Alex Rubin's three-pointer at the 2:38 maintained the 18-point lead for ISU at 41-23. With the basket, Rubin became the ninth Redbird player to score in the first half, and ISU used that balanced scoring attack to take a 43-26 lead into the locker room at halftime.
ISU came out and scored the first five points of the second half to take a 22-point lead at 48-26, but that lead would quickly narrow to just eight points at 53-45 thanks to a 19-5 run by Tennessee State. The Tigers picked up the pace during the run and scored seven points off the fast break and eight points were scored off Redbirds turnovers. TSU would later cut the lead to seven points at 56-49 after a jumper by Miller, before Clark connected for the fifth time from three-point range to extend the ISU lead back to double digits at 59-49 with 8:03 left.
Rubin's second three-pointer of the game gave the Redbirds an 11-point advantage soon after at the 6:49 mark, but back-to-back three-point baskets from TSU's Chris Conner and Miller cut the ISU lead to five points at 62-57 with six minutes left in the game. The ISU lead remained at five points, until Clark hit his sixth three-pointer of the game to put the Redbirds up 67-59 with just under three minutes left in the game.
That eight-point lead would dwindle to three points, when Peters connected on his fourth three-pointer of the game to make the score 69-66 in favor of ISU with 1:11 left in the game, which forced Jankovich to call a timeout. Coming out of the break, Hill found John Ekey for a well-designed alley-oop dunk to push the lead back to five points at 71-66.
A layup by Conner with 18 seconds left cut the ISU lead back to three points at 71-68, but a free throw from Carmichael with 16 seconds left and a free throw from Ekey with four seconds left secured the 73-68 victory for ISU. The Redbirds return to action Sunday, Nov. 21, when they travel to Arkansas-Little Rock for a non-conference matchup against the Trojans. Tip-off is set for 2:05 p.m. from the Jack Stephens Center.
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