Blackston's double-double helps PVAMU beat Georgia State

Nov 23, 2017, 12:45 pm

LAS VEGAS -- Gary Blackston had a double-double and Zachary Hamilton scored 17 points, including five 3-pointers, to help Prairie View A&M beat Georgia State 71-56 on Wednesday night to win the Middleweight bracket of the MGM Grand Main Event.

Blackston, a junior college transfer playing his fifth game for Prairie View (2-3) had career highs of 21 points and 10 rebounds. Dennis Jones added 13 points.

Jones and Blackston sandwiched 3-pointers around a layup by Georgia State's Devin Mitchell to start a 15-2 run that made it 26-13 and PVAMU led the rest of the way. Georgia State (3-2), which trailed by 13 at the break, used a 10-3 spurt -- as Prairie View missed its first six second-half field-goal attempts -- to trim its deficit to four points with about 10 minutes to go, but PVAMU scored nine straight points to make it 57-43 with six minutes left and Georgia State never again threatened.

Malik Benlevi had 17 points on 7-of-9 shooting and D'Marcus Simonds scored 16 for Georgia State.