Martin’s hot shooting not enough as SEMO men’s fall to Little Rock in 73-71 thriller

Rob Martin lofted a half-court 3-pointer with 1.1 seconds left with an opportunity to blow the roof off the Show Me Center.

Had it fallen an inch or two shorter, the Southeast Missouri State Redhawks would have manifested one of the most dramatic finishes of the men’s college basketball season.

After leading by double digits for the majority of the second half, Little Rock used late-game heroics to outlast SEMO 73-71 on Tuesday night.

Trailing 71-68 with 10.7 seconds left, Redhawk sophomore BJ Ward received a quick pass from Martin and drained a corner 3 to tie things up and send a shockwave through the home crowd.

“That was a big shot by BJ,” Martin said. “Coach told us to get downhill and just to find the open man, and BJ made a big shot. He tied the game right there.”

However, following a SEMO timeout, Little Rock’s Johnathan Lawson silenced the home crowd after he raced down the court and hit a clutch jumper with 1.1 seconds remaining to put the road Trojans ahead to stay.

“I thought our defensive effort was great,” head coach Brad Korn said. “I don't know what they ended with in the second half. First half, they made some unbelievable shots that were highly contested and we did a pretty good job. All in all, I thought we did a great job of full-court pressure and then even fighting pressures in the half court. So overall, pretty pleased, actually.

“But we only made six 3s. We missed nine free throws. And I don't want to have to go back and watch the film. I don't know how many shots at the rim when we had the ball in the paint and got absolutely nothing out of it. So, I thought we just missed way too many opportunities at the rim. If you missed nine free throws in a tight game like that, it's going to come back and bite you at some point.”

The red-hot Martin cruised to a team-high 19 points on 6-of-13 shooting. Teddy Washington Jr. and Brendan Terry both added 12 apiece, while Marqueas Bell had his second double-digit scoring game of the season after finishing with 10.

SEMO (9-9, 4-3 Ohio Valley Conference) has now dropped three of its last four, losing back-to-back home games for the first time this season.

Despite entering the night with the worst-ranked offense in the OVC (68.2 points per game), Little Rock (10-7, 4-2) cooked from the field by shooting at a 49% clip. Lawson, a Creighton transfer, posted a game-high 28 points and added seven rebounds to his output. Teammate Isaiah Lewis added 17 before fouling out late in the game.

Behind lackluster rebounding and errant shooting on the offensive end, SEMO found itself down 13-0 to start the game. That’s until Martin connected with junior Braxton Stacker on an alley-oop dunk to get the Redhawks on the board.

SEMO took its first lead of the game with 7:04 left on a Bell layup, which made it 19-18. That’s before Little Rock closed the first half by surging on a 14-4 run to take a 37-29 advantage at the break.

Anchored by Lawson’s 16 first-half points, the Trojans were shooting efficiently from the floor (50%) while the home team was not (37%).

The second half did not start any better for SEMO, which opened the frame by being on the receiving end of a 7-2 run and eventually trailed as much as 14 points midway through.

But the Redhawks still found a way to stay in it.

Martin sank a jumper with 57 seconds left to make it 69-66, inducing Korn to call a timeout.

Then, following a wild 10-second sequence that saw Ward sink a clutch corner 3 and Lawson hit a dagger of a jumper with 1.1 seconds remaining, Martin had a chance to win it with a last-second half-court shot that ricocheted just off the backside of the rim.

Martin’s Resurgence

Perhaps “resurgence” is not the right word for the star junior’s midseason breakout, but Martin has been the engine of the Redhawk offense in recent times.

After leading the team with 11.9 points per game last season, Martin has yet again taken on the alpha role as of late by leading SEMO in scoring each of the last three games.

“I felt like I was in a shooting slump,” Martin said after dropping 21 points against Morehead State Saturday. “Really, it's just finding my guys. I feel like I could score way more last year. I feel like this year is just more fun with my guys getting assists and scoring when they need to. I feel like score on a high level, but feel like I'm back in my groove and making shots and getting the team involved, too.”

The selfless point guard also entered Tuesday with the fifth-most assists in the conference and is just 19 assists shy of reaching 200 in his career.

“I think since I was little, always having been a small guard, scoring is not like the main option,” Martin said Tuesday night. “Finding my teammates and just being that leader and getting my teammates to get going is huge for me. Just not really turning the ball over and take care of the ball, and the coach can trust me. So, it's a bigger part of my game.”

While the Redhawks had three other players hit double digits Tuesday, Martin has been the only hot shooter in recent games. Therefore, if SEMO can keep Martin as involved as he's been as of late, in addition to more consistent big performances from players like Washington Jr. and Ward, it could change the complexion of this team moving forward.

“It's unfortunate just because we've come up short in these last few games,” Korn said. “You just feel that if you have one more guy out of 10, you feel really, really good. We’ve been into this scoring lull these last couple of games, so it's too much to just put on Teddy to go score or too much to just put on Rob to score. So, collectively as a group, we have to do a better job of scoring the ball.”

What’s next?

SEMO opens a three-game road stretch on Thursday, Jan. 14, when Korn’s squad travels to Cookeville, Tennessee for a date with Tennessee Tech (9-8, 4-2). Tip off is set for 7:30 p.m.