Middle Tennessee took over to start the second half and hung on to defeat No. 25 Florida Atlantic 74-70 on Thursday night in a Conference USA matchup at Murfreesboro, Tenn.
Camryn Weston finished with 16 points and seven rebounds to lead the Blue Raiders (16-11, 9-7 C-USA), who trailed by one point at halftime. Elias King added 15 points, and Eli Lawrence and Justin Bufford chipped in 13 and 12, respectively, including key free throws late in the game.
Middle Tennessee, which began the night in fourth place in the conference, avenged an 85-67 loss to Florida Atlantic in Boca Raton, Fla., last month.
Alijah Martin led the first-place Owls (24-3, 14-2) with 15 points, although he shot just 6 of 14 from the floor. Vladislav Goldin added 14 points on 7-of-10 shooting around the basket, and Michael Forrest scored 13 points, hitting 3 of 6 from 3-point range. Goldin also had eight rebounds.
Johnell Davis, who scored 25 points in the first game against Middle Tennessee, had nine on Thursday.
Middle Tennessee, which was playing its first home game against a ranked opponent since 2008, came out of intermission with a 20-6 burst, fueled in part by six Florida Atlantic turnovers. Seven Blue Raiders scored during the span, with Weston and Teafale Lenard Jr. contributing four points apiece.
The Blue Raiders, who shot 45.3 percent from the floor, extended their lead to as many as 15 points midway through the second half. However, the Owls pulled within 70-67 with 39 seconds left on Martin’s 3-pointer. Florida Atlantic hit 10 of 11 shots in one stretch and finished the game at 49.2 percent overall.
After Bufford hit two free throws and Lawrence split a pair to push the lead back to six, Florida Atlantic’s Jalen Gaffney (eight points, seven rebounds) nailed a trey to again get the visitors within three. But Lawrence split another pair of free throws with 2.6 seconds left to lock up the win.
Florida Atlantic hung around by hitting 45.8 percent of its 3-point attempts (11 of 24). The Owls were tops in the nation in bench scoring at 37.5 points per game but were held to 27 points from reserves on Thursday.
Middle Tennessee, which hit only 33.3 percent from long range (5 of 15), outrebounded Florida Atlantic 40-32 and had 11 offensive boards.
–Field Level Media