CONWAY, S.C. – Jaylen Shaw scored 16 points, and Coastal Carolina shot 55 percent in the first half en route to an 82-70 Sun Belt Conference men's basketball victory over Georgia Southern Saturday afternoon in the HTC Center.

Ike Smith tallied 25 points, four rebounds and two blocked shots for Georgia Southern (16-9, 9-3), while Mike Hughes scored 14.  Jake Allsmiller netted nine points, and Tookie Brown finished with seven points and six assists.

Colton Ray-St Cyr recorded 16 points and 10 rebounds for Coastal Carolina (12-13, 7-5), and Elijah Wilson scored 13 to become the third Chanticleer in school history to cross the 1,700 point plateau. Shivaughn Wiggins collected 13 points, five rebounds and three assists.

The story
Georgia Southern dug itself a 17-point hole in the first half. The Eagles trimmed the deficit to two points early in the second half but could not get over the hump.

Coastal Carolina hit seven of its first 12 shots to start the game, while the Eagles went 3 of 12 at the other end. The Chanticleers broke a 6-6 tie with an 11-0 run, and Wiggins and Ray-St Cyr hit triples in a 10-0 spurt that gave CCU a 32-15 advantage with 7:20 left in the half.

Allsmiller and Smith hit 3-pointers in an 11-3 Eagle run to cut the margin to 44-37 at halftime, and Smith hit two triples in a 7-2 spurt to start the second period, cutting the lead to two points. Shaw made a jumper to give the Chanticleers some breathing room, and the cushion stayed between three and eight points for the next 10 minutes of game time.

A layup by Montae Glenn made the score 69-63 with 6:33 to play, but that was as close as the Eagles would get. Ray-St Cyr hit a 3-pointer for CCU, and the Chants built the lead back up to 10 on a Demario Beck dunk with 1:03 remaining.

The Eagles shot 39 percent from the floor and were outrebounded 46-24, including 11-3 on the offensive glass.

Quotables by head coach Mark Byington
"My message to the guys all week was how good they are in this building. They played a lot of games on the road in the league, but they are 5-1 at home now. I told them it's going to be a different team than the first time we played, and I don't think it set in. We weren't quite ready to start the game, and we were a little out of rhythm and a little frustrated. It carried over until about the six or seven minute mark in the first half, and then we started going and playing and we played decently well after that. But we set ourselves back so much, and it was such an uphill battle that we couldn't come back and finish the deal. We weren't at the same level as them today. They were very good."

"We didn't start off very well, but we shot the ball okay. We didn't finish around the rim very well, and we did a poor job rebounding. To get three offensive rebounds off of 32 misses is discouraging, and I hate seeing that. We have some guys who need to learn how they can impact the game and do some things there."

Next up
The Eagles travel to Boone to play longtime rival Appalachian State in a Sun Belt contest Monday. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m., and the game will be broadcast live on ESPN3.

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