South Dakota State sent its seniors out in style on Saturday night, and competed the fourth perfect home season in Frost Arena with a dominating 81-56 win over Oral Roberts in front of 5,347 fans.
The Jackrabbits improve to a perfect 13-0 at home this season, with 17 straight home wins, and move to 21-8 overall and to 12-3 in The Summit League. The Golden Eagles fall to 15-13 overall and to 8-6 in league play.
“I just thought we were really sharp tonight, a little slow offensively the first three or four minutes, but then we really picked up the pace,” head coach Scott Nagy said. “It starts with defense, and the one thing we’ve been doing a pretty good job of lately is rebounding the basketball, and that’s been a big reason for our push.”
SDSU scored first and never trailed, but the Jacks led by just two at 8-6 with just under 16 minutes left in the first half, when they erupted for a 19-2 run, bookended by runs of 8-0 and 11-0, the second of which ended with a 27-8 Jackrabbit lead with 11 minutes, 30 seconds left in the first half.
The Golden Eagles would cut that lead to 14 twice in the next few minutes, but the Jacks increased it to as many as 26 in the first half before taking a 45-22 lead into halftime.
Oral Roberts scored first in the second half, but the Jacks scored the next six points to push the lead to 31 points at 54-23, and would lead by as many as 35 points in the half with just under 12 minutes remaining.
All 14 Jackrabbits in uniform played, with 10 of them scoring. George Marshall led the way with 17 points, and tied a career-high with five 3-pointers. Cody Larson added 15 points and six rebounds in his final home game, while Deondre Parks added 13 points in the win.
The only ORU player to reach double figures, Albert Owens led the Golden Eagles with 18 points off the bench.
The game also marked the final home game for Zach Horstman, who finished with two points, four rebounds and a steal.
“You look at Zach’s four years, and I don’t think there’s been a more successful guy in the Division I era in terms of wins we’ve had when he’s been on our team, and certainly he has a lot to do with that, Cody has a lot to do with that,” Nagy said about the seniors. “We’re so thrilled that he came to us two years ago, even though there was some buzz about it, and some concern about it, he’s been nothing but tremendous off the floor. They’re both great students, they’ll both be great leaders in their community and I’m proud that I had a chance to have them in my life.
The Jackrabbits, who clinched one of the top two seeds in next month’s Summit League Championships with the win, can secure the top seed in the regular season finale next Saturday, when they close the regular season at South Dakota in the South Dakota Corn Showdown Series. The Jacks and Coyotes tip at 4 p.m.
