Mercer beats Tennessee State for first postseason win

Mercer hadn’t played in 11 days, and neither had Tennessee State.

And it showed.

“I knew it was going to be hard for both teams,” Mercer head coach Bob Hoffman said. “We looked like we hadn’t played in awhile; we looked like we were wondering what was going on, why we’re not playing well.”

The teams watched nearly four minutes to go by before the second basket was scored, and they shot a combined 24.6 percent in the first half.

Mercer finally got things going several minutes into the second half to beat Tennessee State 68-60 on Tuesday in the first round of the CollegeInsider.com Tournament at the University Center.

Mercer found out soon after the game that it’ll be home again, hosting Georgia State at 4 p.m. on Saturday. Georgia State, a former conference rival of Mercer, pounded Tennessee Tech 74-43 on Tuesday.

The Bears won their first Division I non-conference tournament game and tied the school record for wins, improving to 23-11. Tennessee State’s season ended at 20-13.

“This being my final year, it’s awesome to actually be a part of some history finally,” senior Justin Cecil said. “It just speaks to how our team stuck together and how everybody’s gone through a lot of adversity this year.”

Cecil had his best game in several weeks, getting hot early in the second half en route to a game-high 19 points.

“I was in a shooting slump,” said Cecil, who was 23-of-80 in the 11 games preceding Tuesday night with only 68 points. “The team and coaches just told me to keep shooting it, keep believing in it. We had a little bit of a break, which I could kind of a get my mind off of it.”

Daniel Coursey added 16 points and five blocks, sharing rebound honors with Bud Thomas, each with eight. Travis Smith chipped in 10 off the bench. Coursey was perfect on eight free-throw tries.

“I thought post play, Coursey being aggressive, what we went back and did last week, going after it hard, hitting hard,” Hoffman said of a key. “It was amazing how much tougher I thought we were (Tuesday night) in the post against very good post players.”

Robert Covington, who played the final 22 minutes with a tweaked ankle, topped the Tigers with 18 points while Kenny Moore added 11 an Jordan Cyphers 10.

Tennessee State led 21-19 at halftime, and the pace picked up in the second half for both teams.

Cecil scored 10 points in the first three minutes of the half as Mercer went up 31-26, but Tennessee State answered.

Mercer tied it at 44 when Langston Hall scored his first points on a 3-pointer with 9:19 left in the game.

He put the Bears on top with another 3-pointer 55 seconds later and then forced an over-and-back on Wil Peters.

This story was originally published March 13, 2012 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Mercer beats Tennessee State for first postseason win."