NORMAL, Ill. – A 20-5 second half-opening run turned an eight-point halftime lead into a 25-point Redbird advantage, as Illinois State got 28 points from Antonio Reeves and a career-high 20 points from Howard Fleming Jr. in an 86-66 season-ending win at Redbird Arena.
Reeves' 28 points gives him 627 for the season, just the eighth player in program history to reach the 600-point plateau, as he now stands seventh in single-season points, while also leading the MVC through the end of the regular season. Fleming Jr., who came into the game with a career-high of 11 points, scored 20 points on 8-of-10 shooting from the field, becoming the sixth different Redbird this season to eclipse the 20-point plateau in a game. Mark Freeman narrowly missed the 20-point mark, scoring 17 points with a game-high six assists and two steals.
The Redbirds and Sycamores will meet again on Thursday, March 3, the opening game of the 2022 State Farm Missouri Valley Conference Tournament in a 6 p.m. tip-off in the Enterprise Center.
The teams went back-and-forth early, as Indiana State led by as many as four points, the last time coming with 12:35 to play in the opening half, and the teams were tied at 30 with 5:13 to play. The Redbirds followed the tie score with nine consecutive points, taking a lead they would not give up for the remainder of the game, and had an eight-point lead heading into the game at halftime.
Illinois State scored the first nine points out of the locker room, and later used an 11-0 run to stretch the margin to 25 – the highest it would reach in the game, before cruising the rest of the way in the 20-point win.
The Redbirds made 34-of-63 of its shots in the game, 54.0 percent, while converting on 9-of-22 long-range tries, a percentage of 40.9 and all nine of their free throw attempts. Indiana State made 39.3 percent of its shots from the field (22-of-56), and 8-of-29 from long range.
Zach Hobbs scored a team-high 15 points off the bench, while Julian Larry scored 12 and Kailex Stephens 11. Sycamore leading scorer Cooper Neese – who scored a game-high 28 points against the Redbirds two weeks ago – was held to just three points in the game.
GoRedbirds.com and the Illinois State Redbirds App: Your sources for Illinois State tickets, Weisbecker Scholarship Fund gifts, multimedia, Redbird merchandise, photos and more.
