FINAL STATS

STARKVILLE, Miss. – McNeese scored the first eight points of the game against the SEC's Mississippi State, then never looked back while four of the seven players that saw the floor scored in double-figures to help lead the Cowboys to a 66-47 route over the Bulldogs here on Tuesday night in the final tune-up before starting Southland Conference play at home on Saturday against defending league champion Stephen F. Austin.
 
The victory was the first for the Cowboys (6-5) over a member of one of the big five conferences since an 80-75 win at Texas Tech on Dec. 16, 2012, and just the fourth in school history over a member of the SEC. It's the second win in eight tries over Mississippi State (6-6) with the first victory coming in the very first meeting in the series to open the 1985-86 season.
 
"This definitely gives us some confidence going into conference play," said head coach Dave Simmons. "The guys came back focused after the holidays. We told them our effort starts at practice and we've had some great practices leading up to tonight."
 
McNeese jumped out to an 8-0 lead before Mississippi State could really get its offense in motion. The Cowboys never trailed in the game and the closest MSU would get would be four points at 4-0 and again at 17-13.
 
"That was huge," said Simmons of getting out to the quick start. "It shocked them and it really shocked us too because we've been coming out of the gate slow lately. We were hitting some shots and they didn't shoot well from the perimeter."
 
Desharick Guidry led all scorers with 20 points but only needed 13 to become the 28^th player in school history to score his 1,000^th career point. He saw his nation's longest double-double streak come to an end at nine games with five boards on the night. But what he didn't pull in was corralled by Lewis, who grabbed a game-high nine rebounds to go with 12 points. Kevin Hardy only scored four points but hauled in seven boards and had three steals while the big stat of the night came from the bench when Matthew Moss knocked down 4 of 5 from the field (3-for-4 three-pointers) and finished with a career-best 11 points.
 
"We talked about our bench play after the Central Michigan game," said Simmons in a game where his team was outscored 44-18 in that area. "Austin (Lewis) played just a handful of minutes in the last few games because of an ankle injury, and he tweaked it again tonight, but he gutted through it and was big for us."
 
Jamaya Burr was also big at the point position scoring 13 points with nine assists and two steals.
 
McNeese held the Bulldogs to 42 percent shooting from the field (18 of 43) and 26.7 percent from long range (4 of 15). Mississippi State sank just 36.4 percent in the second half.
 
"This was our best 40 mintues of defense this year," said Simmons. "It's an effort we put together as a team. We both play zone so we knew the team that would shoot the best would have the advantage."
 
The Cowboys knocked down 52 percent (26 of 50) from the floor and 47.1 percent from three-point range (8 of 17). The Cowboys sank 56 percent (14 of 25) in the first half that helped them build a 36-23 lead.
 
After building an 8-0 run, MSU closed the gap to four points twice with the latest at 17-13 following a Craig Sword jumper with 10:17 to play in the half. McNeese then scored nine straight behind back-to-back treys from Moss to make it 26-13 a little over three minutes later.
 
The Cowboys rolled off eight straight in a two minute span after MSU cut the gap to 28-19 with 4:41 to play. A tip-in by Guidry made it 36-19 with 2:25 to play before MSU scored the final four points of the half.
 
Both teams traded baskets through the first five minutes of the second half before McNeese scored 12 straight to make a 41-30 game into a 53-30 blowout. Moss connected on his third 3-pointer along with a layup during that streak while Burr hit a jumper and a step-back three-pointer. The Bulldogs would not get closer than 17 points the rest of the way and made just three field goals in the final four minutes of the game.
 
"We were down on ourselves after the last two games," said Simmons about the losses to Toledo and Central Michigan. "We made a commitment to come back and work hard. We had some tough, hard practices and it carried over into the game."
 
Sword led the Bulldogs with 11 points while I.J. Ready scored 10.
 
McNeese held a 30-21 advantage on the boards.
 
POSTGAME NOTES:
• Desharick Guidry scored 20 points on the night making him the 28^th player in school history to reach the 1,000 career points scored mark. He now has scored 1,007 in his career.
• With 3 steals, Kevin Hardy passed Joe Dumars for No. 2 on the school's all-time career list with 189. He needs 18 to move past Demond Mallet as the all-time leader.
• McNeese is now 2-6 all-time vs. Mississippi State and 4-49 all-time vs. schools from the SEC.
• Tuesday's win was the first of the season away from home (1-3).
• McNeese entered the game with the nation's 2^nd-toughest non-conference schedule.
• McNeese is two wins away from its 1,000^th all-time victory.