Murray State at Southern Indiana preview
WBB: The Racers open up the 2025-26 season in Evansville against the Screaming Eagles
Murray State will hit the road to open the new season this afternoon as they’ll take on Southern Indiana. Here’s what you need to know:
Murray State (0-0 overall) at Southern Indiana (1-0 overall) — 5:00pm CST at Liberty Arena in Evansville, Indiana
Bart Torvik rankings: Murray State #69; Southern Indiana #193
Murray State leads all-time series 5-2 (USI won in Murray, 82-75, last season)
You can watch the game on ESPN+
Jeremy Rose will have the radio call on WNBS 1340-AM, with the pregame showing starting at 4:30pm
Murray State Scouting Report
The last time the Racers were in Evansville, they were cutting down the nets at the Ford Center as they celebrated a Missouri Valley Conference Tournament championship. This afternoon, the journey toward another conference title begins in Evansville, but this time across town at USI’s Liberty Arena.
Murray State blew out Trevecca, 102-61, in their final preseason tune-up Monday night. Haven Ford led the way with 22 points and six rebounds for the Racers. Murray State Head Coach Rechelle Turner was generally happy with the way her team played against Division II Trevecca.
“I thought we played hard,” Turner said. “That’s something that we expect every single night that we go out — the perfect effort that we talk about. There were glimpses of outstanding execution on both sides of the ball, and there were some glaring deficits on both sides of the ball. We’ve got to make sure that we get those cleaned up, partly because we had no scout. I’ll take some credit for us looking like we didn’t know what we were doing, simply because they’re so used to having a scout to follow, and we’ve really locked in on the scout for Southern Indiana. I hope to see an improved defensive effort (today).”
Against Trevecca, Murray State’s defensive performance, statistically, was much better in the 2nd and 4th quarters, where they allowed Trevecca to shoot just 25.8% (8-for-31) from the field. In the 1st and 3rd quarters, Trevecca knocked down 66.7% (18-for-27) from the floor. For Turner, there is a method to those defensive numbers.
“The way the system works, we expect their legs to be tired in the second and fourth quarters, so the shots don’t always fall,” Turner explained. “If you see the shooting percentages in the first and third, they’re probably going to be better than the second and fourth, but then they usually average out. That wasn’t unexpected (against Trevecca), but on the fly, we made some adjustments, and I think we kind of let them just play a little bit to see if they could figure some stuff out. When we realized maybe we needed to step up a little bit, we made some adjustments, and those back doors stopped happening. I think that’s probably something that you’ll see most of the year. If our depth is able to withstand injuries and we are able to play that many kids, other teams’ percentages will go down in the second and fourth quarters, which are two valuable quarters to winning games.”
You saw this theory play out at times last year. During the 2024-25 season, Murray State opponents shot 46.1% from the field in the first quarter, but that dropped to 39.2% in the second quarter. In the 3rd quarter, the number popped back up to 45.0% — but in the 4th quarters, Racer opponents improved to 46.9%. With improved depth this year, this will be a key number to monitor throughout the season to see how well the Racers are able to wear down their opponents over 40 minutes.
Last season, USI came to the CFSB Center and shocked the Racers, 82-75. Turner won’t need much of a pregame speech to get the attention of her team, especially the returners.
“It’s a great challenge,” Turner said. “They’re very well coached. They’re a very good team. They’re big. They really rely on their post players quite a bit, and not all their players played in their exhibition — so here we go again, not really knowing exactly who’s going to play, but we’re going to prepare that they’re all going to be there. I think opening on the road in that type of environment against the team that we kind of need a little get-back on is a great motivator to get the season started.”
Southern Indiana Scouting Report
USI is coming off a 23-13 season, where they advanced to the Super 16 of the WNIT. They lost four starters off last year’s team, as they welcome in four freshman and three transfers. Ali Saunders is the only returning starter from last year, as she averaged 10.5 points, 3.7 rebounds and 4.6 assists per game for USI a season ago.
The Screaming Eagles opened the year Monday with an 85-45 win over Division III Franklin College. Junior forward Chloe Gannon led four Screaming Eagles in double figures with 17 points, one off her career best. Northern Illinois transfer Shannon Blacher made her USI debut with 15 points and seven steals, setting new career-highs.
In last year’s meeting, USI thwarted Murray State’s high-tempo offense by forcing 26 Racer turnovers and converting them into 29 points.
I’ll have a ‘Ride Home’ podcast posted later tonight.