Box Score GREENVILLE, S.C. – The Queens University of Charlotte men's basketball team (17-13) took on No. 3 Lincoln Memorial University (29-1) in the South Atlantic Men's Basketball Championship Semifinals with the game going down to the wire. Queens, seeded fourth, fell 67-64 to close their season, while LMU advances to tomorrow's championship game for the third straight season.
Queens would overcome an 11-point deficit in the second half taking a 62-56 lead with 6:03 to play. However a late push by the Railsplitters allowed LMU to pull within two of Queens with just 1:38 to play, and they would take over with a three-pointer from Gerel Simmons with 11 seconds to play. Following the made basket, Queens'
Marquis Rankin took the ball the length of the court taking a jumper to put the Royals back on top, but his shot would rim out forcing Queens to foul and send the Railsplitters to the foul line where they secured the win.
Queens was led in its first SAC Semifinal appearance by Rankin who scored 15 points on 5-of-11 shooting.
Sean Morgan added 11 points, while
Rob Lewis notched eight points.
Jared Hendryx and
Darryl White also totaled eight points, and
Jedarian Jackson led under the glass with seven rebounds.
The Royals quickly jumped out to a 7-2 lead in today's game, but the Railsplitters just as quickly closed the gap and took a 9-7 lead on a three-point play by Dorian Pinson. Another lay-in from Pinson followed to give LMU a four-point lead, but it was shortly lived as back-to-back buckets from Morgan and Lewis knotted the game at 11-11 with 14:01 to play. From that point on the game would be a close affair seeing nine ties and seven lead changes in just the first half. At the break, LMU took a 34-32 lead into the locker room on the back of a jumper from Tim Pierce with just five seconds to play.
In the second half, the Railsplitters used a 15-8 run capped by three consecutive three-pointers to pull ahead by 11 points. A 30-second timeout by the Royals would put a stop to the run, and out of the short pause Queens erupted with a 22-5 run of their own en route to taking a 62-56 lead with 6:03 remaining.
The Railsplitters saw their first basket since the 10:32 mark when Simmons knocked down a jumper at 5:39 to end a 12-0 spurt by the Royals. Queens' Jackson answered with a fade away jumper in the paint to put the Royals back up by six, but the junior's basket would be the last of the night for Queens as the Railsplitters ended the game with a nine unanswered points to take the win.
The Royals finished the game with a 51.1-percent clip compared to LMU's 43.9 shooting percentage. Additionally, Queens was able to outscore LMU 16-8 in the paint in the second despite being outscored 22-14 in the lane in the first half.
Keenan Peterson was the only Railsplitter to reach double figure scoring after totaling 11 points. He also pulled down eight rebounds to lead all on the floor. Luquon Choice, Tim Pierce and Simmons finished with nine points apiece.
The Railsplitters will face Carson-Newman tomorrow at 4 p.m. in the championship.
