The Eastern men’s basketball team pulled out a 66-61 win over Tennessee State Saturday night in its regular season finale, finishing in fourth place in the Ohio Valley Conference.

The Panthers (18-11,11-7 OVC) finished in the three-way tie with Austin Peay 17-14, 11-7 OVC) and Eastern Kentucky (20-11, 11-7 OVC).

Austin Peay beat Southeast Missouri 71-68 in overtime while Eastern Kentucky fell to Murray State 88-74 Saturday.

All three teams split their two match-ups with one another this season, so the tiebreaker was how the teams fared against Murray State (27-4, 17-1 OVC) and Morehead State (21-9, 15-3 OVC), the top two teams in the conference.

Both Eastern and Austin Peay have a higher ranking than Eastern Kentucky as both are 1-1 against Morehead State while the Colonels lost both contests to the Eagles.

Eastern and Austin Peay were both 1-1 against the No. 6 seed Tennessee Tech, so No. 7 Jacksonville State became the deciding tiebreaker.

The Governors were 2-0 against the Gamecocks, while the Panthers were 1-1.

Eastern will host the Colonels at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday in Lantz Arena for the quarterfinals of the OVC Tournament.

This is the first time the Panthers are in the top four for the OVC Tournament since 2001, the year they won the tournament title.

Bob Bajek can be reached at 581-7944 or rtbajek@eiu.edu.