TULSA – Mozae Downing-Rivers engineered a key 7-1 Missouri State run with five minutes left to help the Bears erase an 11-point second-half deficit and score a 72-67 road win at Oral Roberts on Sunday.
Downing-Rivers started the rally with a slick pass to Michael Osei-Bonsu to give the Bears (5-3) a 65-60 lead. Later, he used his shooting touch to bury an elbow jumper and a three-pointer to push the visitors ahead 70-61 with 3:12 to play.
The Golden Eagles would trim their deficit to three inside 30 seconds to play, but Dez White helped seal it with two free throws in crunch time as the Bears secured their first true road victory of the campaign.
White led all Missouri State players with 18 points, while Zaxton King scored 12, Jalen Hampton added 11, and Chase Martin scored 10. Osei-Bonsu finished just shy of a double-double with 9 points and a game-high 10 rebounds.
Oral Roberts (2-6) was led by Issac McBride with 20 points, while Sam Alajiki scored 16, and Josh Jones added 10 for the home side.
The Bears logged a season-high 10 threes and shot 54.2 percent from the field, also a season-high.
The game was anything but easy for the visiting Bears who trailed 42-30 with 2:08 left in the opening half before cutting their deficit to nine at the break.
ORU opened the second half with a bucket by Jones to make it 44-33 with 18:52 to go.
But the Bears began to chip away and took less than five minutes to knot the score, 48-48, on the heels of a 15-4 run. White buried three of his four treys in that span with key buckets from King, Osei-Bonsu and Hampton to even things up at the 14-minute mark.
ORU responded a 6-1 surge of its own to lead by five before Downing-Rivers hit a jumper, White knocked down two free throws and Hampton returned the lead to the Bears on a layup with 11:18 to go.
The lead teetered back and forth four more times until White’s bucket off the glass at the 9:19 mark gave the Bears a 59-58 lead. MoState would never trail again, and Downing-Rivers efforts pushed the Bears to the nine-point lead until he exited the game with 2:27 to play.
For the afternoon, The Bears were 26-of-48 (.542) overall, 10-for-19 (.526) from three and 10-of-15 (.667) at the line with a 31-20 rebounding advantage and 15 assists.
ORU was 22-of-49 (.449) overall, but just 9-for-24 (.375) in the second half. The Golden Eagles finished 7-for-19 (.368) from three and 16-of-19 (.842) at the line with 10 turnovers.
In the first half, the Bears shot 50 percent from the field but a pivotal 13-0 run by the Golden Eagles pushed the home side ahead 42-33 at the intermission.
After ORU buried its first four 3-point attempts to lead 14-9 out of the gates, the Bears clawed their way back from an eight-point deficit to lead on a triple by White with eight minutes to go. Later, King’s trey at the 7:15 mark gave the Bears a 25-23 lead before ORU’s 13-point swing gave the home side a double-figure lead, 36-25, and later led by as many 12 12.
The Bears responded with five quick points from Makhai Valentine and collected three free throws before the break to close their deficit to nine. ORU shot 52 percent in the opening 20 minutes, made seven threes and converted 9-of-10 free throws.
Missouri State is back home on Saturday at 7 p.m. to open Missouri Valley Conference play against defending champion Indiana State at Great Southern Bank Arena.
