Tweet #theGAC  DURANT, Okla. – For the second-straight season Southeastern will be playing the Great American Conference Championship Game, earning a berth with a 68-58 semifinal win over No. 17 Arkansas Tech on Friday evening in Russellville, Ark.

The win lifts the Savage Storm to 13-7 on the season and gives them a second-straight berth in the GAC Championship game, and with Southern Nazarene's win over Southwestern Oklahoma State on Friday night, SE will host the title game at 1 p.m. on March 7 at Bloomer Sullivan Arena.

"Arkansas Tech is tough," said junior guard Kamryn Cantwell. "They're one of those teams where they can just kill you inside the paint and so our goal was to pack the paint in. We're going to give up the three, that's not something they do a lot. So, we knew we had to shut down the paint and I thought we did a great job of doing that today."

"I knew that they were such a good offensive team," said head coach Darin Grover, "That it was going to be unrealistic to say we were going to hold them to 65 because they were averaging 79 point per game or whatever it was. We haven't been a great offensive team this year but Briley and Kam have really carried us and we have kids that have stepped up in different games. I just felt like our kids executed our game plan to perfection. We're going to give up the three. They are so good off the dribble that we have to give up something."

Briley Moon led all scorers with 17 points in the contest hitting a pair of threes and connecting on 9-of-10 from the free throw line.

Moon completed the double-double by hauling in 11 rebounds to lead the Storm.

Kamryn Cantwell was right behind with 16 points on 7-of-12 shooting from the field, and nearly turned in a double-double as well, finishing with nine rebounds.

Katie Branam added 12 points with a pair of threes, while Chandler Kemp chipped in 11 points and pulled down seven rebounds.

SE finished the game shooting 44.4 percent overall from the field, while holding the Golden Suns to just 37.3 percent, and 21.7 percent from beyond the arc.

The teams opened the game trading buckets, with the Golden Suns edging out to a 9-6 lead by the 7:01 mark of the first quarter.

The Storm answered with six-straight capped by a Benson layup to take a 12-9 lead.

ATU would answer with a 6-0 run, but it was back-to-back buckets from Cantwell and Haiden Williams that would give SE a 16-15 lead after one quarter.

The Storm scored the first four points of the low-scoring second quarter to take a 20-15 lead, and the teams would slowly trade buckets over the final six minutes with a Cantwell layup with 27 seconds to play in the half giving SE a 26-20 lead at halftime.

A 7-2 ATU run to open the third quarter would trim the Storm advantage to one point, but Southeastern answered with an 8-0 run capped by a Moon three to go up 36-27 with 5:01 to play in the third.

The Suns followed with eight-straight of their own to close the game to one point again and would trail by one point with under a minute to play and a Kemp layup with 13 seconds to play in the frame would give the Storm a 41-28 lead heading to the fourth.

ATU would close the lead to 43-41 inside of the first minute of the fourth quarter, but Branam and Moon combined to put together a 10-0 run over the next two minutes, and a Moon three with 5:37 to play would give the Storm a 53-41 lead.

The Suns would cut the SE lead to eight points six times over the final 4:50, but each time the Storm had an answer, the last time coming on a pair Moon free throws with 20 seconds to play which set the final score of 68-58.