MONTICELLO, Ark. — Henderson State gave No. 1 seed Arkansas-Monticello all it could handle on Friday night in the GAC Semifinals, but the Weevils out-scored the Reddies 16-6 in overtime to hold on and advance to the tournament title game with an 80-70 win.

The loss ends the season for HSU, who finishes 11-9 overall and was looking to repeat as GAC Tournament Champions.

Raekwon Rogers turned in a terrific performance for the Reddies in defeat and ended with a season-high 25 points on 11-of-15 shooting and 14 rebounds. Xavier Davenport added 13 points while Damian Dear had 10 off the bench. 

It was a dream start for the Reddies on the road, as Henderson jumped out to a 9-0 lead after UAM went scoreless for the first five-plus minutes on its home floor. The Weevils countered over the remainder of the half and hit eight of their next 11 shots to get back into it and cut the HSU lead to 31-30 at the break.

The contest was a street fight from that moment on. Neither team held a lead of more than four points in the second half, the lead changed hands seven times over the course of the period and the game was tied four times in the final 3:19.

With Monticello leading it 64-62 with less than a minute to go, Davenport hit a runner in the lane to tie the game with 49 seconds left. The Weevils had three opportunities to take the lead and win in the last 30 seconds after two HSU turnovers, but the Reddies defense stood tall each time and forced three stops to send the semifinal contest into overtime.

UAM seized the momentum immediately to begin the extra period, as back-to-back 3-pointers from DaJuan Jones gave Monticello its largest lead of the game, 70-64. Henderson refused to go away, and got two buckets from Davenport and Rogers to cut it back to 70-68, but another five-straight from Jones reestablished a 75-68 advantage for the Weevils with 1:53 to go. 

The Reddies did all they could in the final moments, including forcing two UAM turnovers to give themselves a chance, but the shots did not fall on the other end and Monticello was able to close it out and hold on to advance to the title game.

Jones of UAM was spectacular in overtime and scored the Weevils' first 11 points. HSU was just 3-for-10 from the floor in the extra period and shot 3-of-15 from beyond the arc on the night. Henderson out-scored Monticello 44-20 in the paint and led for 22:59 in the loss.