Liberty in Blue Raider territory

6-YARD RECEIVING TOUCHDOWN BY HAYES SUTTON

Hayes Sutton hauls in his first touchdown pass of his Blue Raider career and MTSU goes up 7-0 with Zeke Rankin's extra point.

Liberty: 0
Middle Tennessee: 7
9:16 1Q

Big rush by Vattiato, big play by Javonte Sherman in addition to roughing the passer puts them in goal-to-go situation

Liberty drops a backwards pass and Brandon Buckner recovers the fumble. MTSU in Flames territory now

Nick Vattiato sacked by Eliyt Nairne

Chadwick pins Liberty at their own 11

True freshman tight end Brody Benke makes his debut in a 12 personnel set. He will not lose his redshirt no matter what now

Offense starts with a 30 yard gain by Cam'ron Lacy

Liberty wins the coin toss and defers

Omari Kelly officially OUT for today

MidTennMtneer said:

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Watched but never saw this.

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Rewatched their 107-74 win in opener against Howard Payne (D3). The most impressive stats is ACU scored 107, shot just 3/13 from deep, and gave up 33 turnovers. It was ugly basketball.

Those numbers are telling of the style ACU plays with. It was a blur constantly running the floor, overly aggressive passing to move the ball up the floor quickly. The 3/4 trap created some problems for ACU early, they eventually settled in but I cant emphasis enough about slowing their transition offense will be key in winning on the road.

ACU is smaller than MTSU which should give them the edge down low guarding Leonardo Bettiol (#3, 6’8”). He scored 22 points (9/11 shooting) with 8 rebounds. At the guards they have Oklahoma State transfer Quion Williams (#5, 6’5”) scored another 20 points (9/11 shooting) and their 3rd best scorer from ‘23-‘24, Hunter Jack Madden (#21, 6’2”) averaged over 11 ppg. They both will be tasked with taking better care of the ball today as they combined for 7 assists and 11 turnovers in the opener.

After both openers against D3 opponents it’s always tough to see how the game will transfer against better competition. I think the game plan has to be: win the turnover and rebounding battles, and force ACU to run a half court offense. I personally think the -3.5 spread for ACU is wild, but Vegas has seen the road struggles for MTSU. In a vacuum, MT was far more impressive through one game.

Good win and that will boost our NET ranking when it’s all said and done. GCU looks like a clear favorite in the WAC, so another tournament team on the resume.

Did a great job keeping their best player off the floor with 2 points and fouling out in just 15 minutes. Scott and Gregory drew 8 fouls apiece! Will need to replicate that effort on Tuesday.

As many have said GCU is a diet version of what UT runs on defense. They both thrive on chaos. Forced us into 18 turnovers, held us to 1-10 from deep, and out rebounded us 39-32. Really was a recipe to lose but we played better defense.

As Gregory said in her post game, “the shots will fall!” Just give her time to find her groove like she did last November.

We beat a solid team tonight, maybe top 50? Great crowd for a Nov. Friday night. If we were playing UT here next week I think it might sell out, lot of excitement in this town for the Lady Raiders!

Is black a new official color and no one told us? It’s now being worn every game it seems.

MTFAN61 said:

This was a perfect game to prep us for a fight against Tennessee.

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100%, this was a really good game to have before UT as they're going to put even more pressure when we have the ball.

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BTW was at the game. Being on the same night as opening round of high school football playoffs was expecting similar crowd to our exhibition games. Practically every team in Rutherford County were in playoffs tonight. Was surprised to see our crowd seemed almost double to our exhibitions. Flipped over on ESPN+ for some replay when getting home. Video didn't really give justice as home side view was mostly blocked, but D, E, & F had a sizeable attendance tonight.

This was a perfect game to prep us for a fight against Tennessee. GCU came out ready to fight, & are a very tough team. Wouldn't be surprised they knock off Oregon & Arizona St both this year. We weren't exactly ready for such a hard fight that first period. However by the end of 2nd quarter we were not only matching their intensity we were beating it. And by midway through the 3rd they were wearing down.
I hope Jada or Savannah can spell Courtney a few minutes next Tuesday. She was exhausted.
Concerning Tennessee, they have played 3 easy opponents to build their team's confidence & garner attention for a few blowouts. We may not win Tuesday, but Tennessee has yet to play such an aggressive defense as what MT has to offer. I'm somewhat disappointed in Gregory's & Arike's offense thus far, but you can't spite their defensive tenacity. Very impressive. Hopefully our offense will have a little more cohesion for our next game.
But for so early in the season our defense kicks butt!