Jackson, Miss. – The College of Coastal Georgia men's basketball team lost at the buzzer Saturday at Belhaven, falling to the hometown Blazers 90-88 in a Southern States Athletic Conference contest.
Belhaven's Josh Gaskin scored on a tip-in with one second left that gave his team the victory over the Mariners. Gaskin tipped the ball in the basket following a miss by teammate De'la Meyers just seconds earlier.
The loss was the 10th straight for the Mariners (3-14 overall, 1-5) who have lost five league games in a row since defeating Loyola at home on Nov. 21 in their SSAC opener. That also was Coastal Georgia's last victory.
The Mariners will play at rival Brewton-Parker on Thursday before welcoming Mobile to Howard Coffin Gym for a home game on Saturday.
At Belhaven (5-12, 2-4), the Mariners trailed by as much as 14 points in the opening half before cutting their deficit to 49-46 at the halftime break.
In the second half, Coastal Georgia continued to trail until taking its first lead of the contest at 79-77 with just over six minutes to play on a stickback by Andrew Reid.
The teams were tied four different times over the final six minutes. Coastal Georgia's Reggie Burke forged the final tie on a layup with 28 seconds left that made it 88-88.
The Blazers called back-to-back timeouts before inbounding the ball for their final possession. Gaskin's tip-in followed missed shots by Jordan Bedford, who scored 33 points in the victory, and Meyers who missed a putback attempt which Gaskin tipped into the basket before the final horn for the victory.
Four of Belhaven's five starters scored in twin figures in the win, including Bedford, who was averaging 22.3 points a game to lead the conference in scoring going into Saturday. Bedford also led the Blazers with seven rebounds.
Burke finished with a team-high 19 points for the Mariners. Michael Matta followed with 18, Darrean Wyatt added 17 and Reid scored 15. Jamaal Rhodes scored nine points and had five rebounds for the Mariners.
Coastal Georgia shot 50 percent (32-64) from the field and made 17 of 21 foul shots, but allowed Belhaven to shoot 53 percent (35-66) for the game.
