It may not have been the biggest game in Atlanta this weekend, but Georgia State scraped out an 81-72 victory in a back-and-forth battle for statewide Sun Belt basketball bragging rights at GSU Sports Arena on Saturday afternoon.
Senior Jeff Thomas wasn’t going to have it any other way. He spiked down an emphatic putback dunk with 1:13 left in the game, a play that highlighted a 12-3 Georgia State run that sealed the game and sent the State crowd into a frenzy.
“Probably the least athletic guy in college basketball dunked it, and that’s what got everybody excited,” coach Ron Hunter joked after the game. “But seriously, that’s what seniors do. They make big plays in big moments.”
State guard Kane Williams was just as surprised by the dunk.
“When I saw him running, I thought, ‘Nah, no way,’” Williams said. “But then he made it, and I said, “There goes that man!’”
D’Marcus Simonds led the Panthers with 29 points and six rebounds. Williams scored 19 points off the bench and led the team with three assists. Thomas finished in double figures, tallying 10 points and six boards.
Quan Jackson set the pace for the Eagles with 20 points. Isaiah Crawley added 15 points and three rebounds.
After a sluggish first half, both teams started the second half with a bang. Georgia Southern quickly erased its six-point halftime deficit, earning the lead via a Jackson 3-pointer at the 15:12 mark.
Georgia State, as it had done all game, hit right back. Malik Benlevi had his prayer answered with a lucky bounce off the front rim on an end-of-the-shot-clock jumper to take back the lead. On the following Panthers possession, Simonds took flight from the baseline for an electrifying dunk to extend the lead to 50-47.
Less than a minute later, Simeon Carter of Georgia Southern threw down a crowd-silencing slam of his own, and the Eagles led once more.
Who was there to answer? Simonds, of course. His pure 3-pointer from the corner put the Panthers back in front, 53-51. In all, there were 11 lead changes and five ties in the second half alone.
State and Southern slugged it out in a first half where neither team strung together enough plays to take control of the game. Simonds led all scorers with 15 points, but even he missed plenty of opportunities, going 1-for-5 from the free-throw line.
The traveling Eagles kept the Panthers in the game thanks to a pitiful first-half shooting display of 37 percent from the field and 17 percent on 3-point shots. They also turned the ball over five times to the Panthers’ two.
The final numbers didn’t look much better. Southern finished 5-for-19 from 3-point range and had 15 turnovers. While they missed some open shots, Hunter credited the final stat line to his team’s suffocating defense.
“You have to peak defensively at the right time. We’ve found our groove defensively, and when our matchup is going, it becomes really hard on people,” Hunter said.
With soaring dunks and lead changes throughout, it was clear that Georgia State’s crowd, which went with a “White Out” theme, got its money’s worth. Hunter said while he wants crowds like Saturday’s at every game, the crowd was worth 10 points against the Eagles. The players also showed their appreciation.
“We wanted to show the crowd how much fun we have. Because the crowd came to support, we have to support them with a good show,” Williams said.
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