Brunswick, Ga. – The College of Coastal Georgia men's basketball team stayed within striking distance of Emmanuel College most of the way Tuesday night before the ninth-ranked Lions finally pulled away late for an 80-64 victory over the Mariners at Howard Coffin Gym.
The loss dropped the Mariners (6-21 overall, 4-12 Southern States Athletic Conference) into a three-way tie in the loss column for fifth place in the East Division of the SSAC with Truett-McConnell and Brewton-Parker. All three teams have 12 league losses, but the Mariners have one more win in conference than Truett and two more than Brewton-Parker, having played more league games than both teams.
Southern Polytechnic – a 75-59 winner over Southern Wesleyan on Tuesday – has 11 league losses and is a game ahead of the Mariners in the loss column in the East Division.
All four teams are fighting for the fourth and five spots in the division coming down the stretch of the regular season. The top five teams from both the league's East and West divisions qualify for the conference tournament.
The Mariners will close out the regular season with crucial games against Brewton-Parker and Southern Poly. Coastal Georgia will host the Barons on Thursday night at 8 p.m. on the final home date of the season and will finish out the schedule on Feb. 21 against the Hornets in Marietta.
With their victory over the Mariners on Tuesday, the Lions (24-3, 13-2) stayed on the heels of second-ranked Lee in the East. The Flames have just one league loss while Emmanuel has two. The teams collide in the final game of the season on Feb. 25.
In the first meeting this season at Emmanuel, the Mariners lost to the Lions 71-65.
On Tuesday, Coastal Georgia led early, but would fall behind by as much as 12 points in the opening period before trailing 36-29 at the break.
After halftime, the Mariners would cut their deficit to four once and trailed by just single-digits throughout the first 11 minutes of the second half.
Though Emmanuel took double-digit advantages three different times after that, the Mariners wouldn't go away. They cut their deficit to 67-59 on a three-pointer by Jevan Billinger with 6:01 remaining.
But with a chance to make a run, the Mariners went back-to-back possessions without points and the Lions would go up by 10 again and would run away from there, finishing the game outscoring the Mariners 11-5 over the final 5:01 of the contest.
Coastal Georgia's Kentorey Johnson led all scorers with 22 points for the Mariners in defeat. P.J. Reason was the only other Mariner to reach doubles. He added 16 points.
Adrian Justice scored 18 points to lead four players in doubles for the Lions. Isaiah Tyus followed closely with 17 points.
The Mariners allowed the Lions to shoot 56 percent (28-of-50) for the game. Emmanuel shot 55.6 percent from the three-point line, making 10-of-18 attempts.
Coastal Georgia shot 43 percent (21-of-50) but was just 30 percent from three-point land, hitting only six of their 20 shots from long range.
