Jacks Roll to 87-50 Quarterfinal Win over Western

Saturday, March 7

Sioux Falls, S.D.

6:00 PM

South Dakota State University

Western Illinois

3/7/2015 10:43:00 PM | Men's Basketball

By: SDSU Sports Info

SIOUX FALLS, S.D. – Top-seeded South Dakota State scored a season-high 50 points, and added 37 more in the second half to cruise to an 87-50 win over No. 8 seed Western Illinois in quarterfinals of The Summit League Championships in front of a tournament record 9,773 fans at the new Denny Sanford PREMIER Center.

The Jackrabbits improve to 22-9 on the season with the win and advance to play either No. 4 seed Fort Wayne or No. 5 seed South Dakota in the tournament semifinals on Monday. The Fighting Leathernecks end their season with an 8-20 record.

“Practice on Monday was good, the rest of the week wasn't very good, but I could just tell that they wanted to play, and we responded really well,” head coach Scott Nagy said. “Our whole deal is defense. If we're good defensively, we're usually pretty good offensively, and that was the case tonight.”

Jacks score the first seven points in opening the game on a 15-2 run, and never looked back. They added a 10-0 spurt later in the half, part of a 21-2 run, that pushed the lead to 43-16 with just under three minutes to play in the first half, capped by a Deondre Parks steal and layup, before taking a commanding 50-21 lead into the locker room.

The Jackrabbits scored the first six points in the second half, quickly increased their lead to 37 points at 62-25 on a Keaton Moffitt 3-pointer with 15 minutes, 21 seconds left, before reaching 39 point lead on a high-flying dunk from Skyler Flatten with just over 6 minutes to play.

The last of 12 Jackrabbits to score in the game, Cory Jacobsen hit a triple with just over a minute left to give SDSU its largest lead at 87-47.

George Marshall led a trio of Jackrabbits in double figures with 13 points, adding four rebounds and three assists. Parks added 12 points, six rebounds and three assists, while Moffitt pitched in with a season-high 11 points. Jake Bittle scored nine points and led all players with eight rebounds.

J.C. Fuller led all scorers with 19 points, with Garret Covington adding 13 points in the loss.

SDSU shot an even 47 percent for the game, 31 of 66, and went 12 for 27 from long range. Western Illinois went 18 of 50 from the floor, 36 percent, with a 5 of 18 mark from 3-point range.

The Jackrabbits advance to play either No. 4 seed Fort Wayne or No. 5 seed South Dakota on Monday in the tournament semifinals at 6 p.m. The Mastodons and Coyotes tip on Sunday at 6 p.m.

NOTES: SDSU leads the all-time series with Western Illinois 18-3, with wins in each of the last 15 meetings, and a 3-0 mark in The Summit League Championships … SDSU improves to 10-4 at the league tournament, with a 6-1 all-time mark in the quarterfinals … SDSU also improves to 19-1 when leading at the half, to 3-1 in neutral site games, to 11-1 when holding opponents to fewer than 60 points and to 11-1 in games played on Saturday ... Marshall scored the first points in a men's tournament game at the Denny Sanford PREMIER Center, while Reed Tellinghuisen provided the first dunk in the building ... the Jacks scored a season-high 50 first half points, and scored at least 50 points in a half for the second time this season (51 in the second half vs. Chadron State on Nov. 24) … Moffitt scored in double figures for the first time in a Jackrabbit uniform ... all 14 Jackrabbits in uniform logged at least four minutes in the game