BARTLESVILLE, OK. - Ben Marello had 21 points and Matt Panaggio notched a double-double, but top-seeded East Central used a huge late run to put away a gritty Henderson State team 96-73 on Thursday evening in the first round of the Great American Conference Tournament.
 
The Tigers got off to a quick start and jumped out to an early 8-0 lead in the game's first two minutes. ECU was able to maintain that cushion for the majority of the first period, but the Reddies refused to let the game get away from them. East Central looked to have the momentum heading into halftime as they pushed their lead out to 46-36 with 1:05 to go, but Henderson scored the last two buckets of the period – the second of which came on a late steal from Panaggio who found Eric Dailey for a layup at the buzzer – to cut the lead to 46-40 and snatch back some momentum at the break.
 
Sensing an upset, the Reddies came out strong in the second half and slowly began to whittle away at the ECU lead, twice cutting it down to just two points. With the score 59-57 in the Tigers' favor and 10:41 remaining, Henderson's Kaylon Tappin got a good look at a 3-pointer which would have given the Reddies their first lead, but it was an inch long off of the back iron and went back over to ECU.
 
From that moment on, the tide turned towards East Central. The Tigers refused to miss over the game's final 10 minutes, and made 14 of their final 15 shots from the field during a 37-16 run, which helped them pull away late for a 96-73 victory.
 
Marello led the way for the Reddies, going for 21 points and shooting 8-of-14 from the field. Panaggio also had a strong performance, scoring 11 points and grabbing 11 rebounds to register a double-double. Chris Hawkins added 10 points for Henderson in defeat.  The Reddies won the rebounding battle with the regular season GAC champions 38-35 and had 17 second chance points, but ECU shot 60.7 percent from the field for the game and 64.5 percent in the second half to pull away for a deceptively large margin of victory over a scrappy HSU squad.
 
Henderson's season ends with a 16-13 overall record – the Reddies' best mark since 2012.