Georgia State coach Ron Hunter felt pretty good when his team had doubled up North Carolina Wilmington 32-16 late in the first half and leading scorer R.J. Hunter had yet to make a basket.
It didn’t remain that easy, but the Panthers knocked off the Seahawks 81-63 on Wednesday at the Sports Arena. Georgia State did it with an opportunistic defense that scored 30 points off 17 turnovers. It was Panthers’ (10-11, 5-3 CAA) fourth consecutive victory and kept UNCW (7-11, 2-4) winless on the road this season.
“These guys are playing lights-out basketball, the whole team,” Ron Hunter said.
R.J. Hunter finally got going, finishing with 19 points, six rebounds and six assists. Manny Atkins continued his stellar play, also scoring 19 points with four rebounds and four assists. Devonta White added 17 points and Markus Crider added a career-high 10 rebounds.
Keith Rendleman kept the Seahawks in the game, leading all scorers with 23 points on 9-of-11 shooting. But he was the only consistent player UNCW could throw out against the Panthers, whose defense created 26 fast-break points. Some of those were started by errant 3-pointers. UNCW missed 14 of its 22 attempts, including eight of 10 in the second half.
“Today we came out with a lot of intensity,” Atkins said. “We really tried to keep them from getting the ball inside and make them shoot 3-pointers.”
After leading by as many as 19 with less than seven minutes left in the first half, Georgia State’s lead was cut to six early in the second half on a three-point play by Rendleman.
But White and Hunter hit consecutive 3-pointers to push the Panthers’ lead to 10.
Hunter added three free throws on a savvy move in which he drew contact with little hope of getting the shot off, and Atkins added two more to push the lead to 14 with 13:40 left.
The Seahawks got to within 12 with less than eight minutes left, but Georgia State used an 11-0 run to put away the game.
“That’s what I’ve been really impressed with is our conditioning level,” Ron Hunter said. “We are pressing now more than we’ve pressed all year.”
Rendleman gave Georgia State fits early, scoring UNCW’s first seven points, the last on a dunk after first blocking Atkins’ shot on the other end of the court.
But Georgia State answered with a 9-0 run that included 3-pointers by Atkins, White and Rashaad Richardson in less than 30 seconds to push its lead to 13-7. The last two came off Seahawks’ turnovers.
White scored back-to-back layups a few minutes later to increase the Panthers’ lead to 22-13. Georgia State had four steals, scored eight points off turnovers and 16 fast-break points in the first nine minutes.
A strong move by Crider and another 3-pointer by Atkins – his third in the first 12 minutes – pushed Georgia State’s lead to 27-13. He followed with a drive and layup, and David Travers hit a 3-pointer from the top of the arc to give Georgia State a 32-16 lead with 7 minutes left in the half. All of this and Hunter, the Panthers’ leading scorer, had yet to score.
His drought ended a few seconds later with a 3-pointer that gave Georgia State a 35-16 lead.
The Seahawks answered with a 7-0 run to cut Georgia State’s lead to 35-23 with 3:58 left.
As good as the first 13 minutes were for the Panthers, during the last seven their 19-point deficit was reduced to nine. Seven of UNCW’s final 10 points came at the free-throw line.
“I wasn’t really happy with the way we closed the half out, but again, big picture, we are getting better,” Hunter said.
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