The Lady Raiders and Blue Raiders both punched their tickets to the second round of the Sun Belt Tournament on Saturday in Hot Springs Arkansas. Both teams will play Florida International on Sunday.

The Lady Raiders, after beating ULM, 59-56, will play at noon Sunday and the men at 6:30 p.m.

The MTSU men, now 27-4 on the year, never trailed but it wasn’t easy as the Raiders led by only six points at the half.

After the lead was cut to three numerous times the Raiders finally began to pull away. With a narrow 48-40 lead early in the second half, James Gallman got a steal and an easy lay in to make the score 50-40 Raiders. The lead grew to twenty when Ray Cintron hit two three pointers. The final margin of 81-66 was pleasing to the large Blue Raider crowd in attendance.

Your scoring and important stats. Bruce Massey – 15, Cintron – 12, Gallman – 11, Marcos Knight – 9, 8 for both JT Sulton and Neiko Hunter, 6 for Shawn Jones and 4 each for Jason Jones, Torin Walker and Tweety Knight.

The Raiders won the rebound battle 36-27 and shot 49 percent from the floor.