HATTIESBURG, Mississippi (February 16, 2017) – With just six games left in the regular season coming into Thursday's game at Southern Miss, FIU knew how much was at stake as it battles to move up in the Conference USA standings, and for the final seed in the C-USA Men's Basketball Championship presented by MetroPCS, March 8-11 in Birmingham. The Panthers could ill afford to drop a game to one of the teams that was directly within striking distance in the standings.
Unfortunately for FIU, it could not hold onto a 14-point second half lead as the Golden Eagles stunned the Panthers in overtime, 69-66, at Reed Green Coliseum.
FIU drops to 6-20 on the year and 2-11 in C-USA, while the Golden Eagles improve to 8-18 and 5-9 in league play, snapping a three-game losing streak.
Elmo Stephen led four players in double figures for the Panthers with 17 points, while
Eric Nottage added 15 points in the loss.
Donte McGill and
Michael Kessens each chipped in the 14 and 11 points, respectively.
After Nottage drained a three-point shot with 18 seconds remaining in regulation to tie the game at 60, FIU seemingly took control of the extra session, hitting its first four free throws by Nottage and Kessens, and then a jumper by Stephen with 2:03 left, to put the Panthers up 66-60. That was the last time FIU would score on the night.
With 1:27 left in overtime, Southern Miss's Quinton Campbell hit the first of his back-to-back three-point shots, with the second coming on the next possession with 51 second left to tie the game at 66.
Following an FIU turnover and a Golden Eagles timeout, Southern Miss got the ball back with 34 seconds left and two offensive rebounds led to the Golden Eagles' D'Angelo Richardson's heroics, hitting a fade away three from 25-feet out to win the game.
Neither team came out in the first half and lit the world on fire offensively. The Panthers shot 31 percent (9-of-29) from the field in the first half, while Southern Miss hit on 30.4 percent (7-of-23) of its shots from the floor.
Despite the poor shooting performance, and a seven-plus minute drought that struck both teams at the same time during the first 20 minutes of play, FIU eventually took a 22-15 lead into the locker room at the break behind seven points by Kessens.
The Panthers scored 14 of the first 19 points of the second half to go out to its biggest lead of the game, 36-22, on a Stephen three with 13:45 left in regulation.
With FIU leading by 11, 52-41, with 5:27 left in the second half, Southern Miss chipped away at the lead and put together its own run of 15-0 over 3:24 to take a four-point lead, 56-51, with 1:45 left.
Richardson pushed the lead to three, 60-57, on two free throws with 29 seconds left before Nottage's shot sent the game into overtime.
The Panthers will close out their short swing trip on Saturday, Feb. 18 when they travel to Ruston, Louisiana to face Louisiana Tech at 7 p.m. (ET).
FIU returns to Lime Court at FIU Arena for their final homestand of the season, beginning on Feb. 23 when UTSA comes to Miami (7 p.m.) and then FIU closes out its 2016-17 home slate during Senior Night on Feb. 25 against UTEP (7 p.m.).
Fans are encouraged to follow @FIUHoops on Twitter, and "Like" FIU men's basketball on Facebook (www.Facebook.com/FIUMensBBall) for the latest Panther basketball news.
Follow all of FIU's 18 athletic teams on Google+ (FIU Athletics), Twitter (@FIUAthletics), Facebook (Facebook.com/FIUSports), YouTube (FIUPanthers), and Instagram (FIUathletics).
#####
About FIU Athletics: FIU Athletics is home to more than 400 student-athletes in 18 different sports. Athletic events are played in seven different venues on FIU's campuses (Modesto A. Maidique and Biscayne Bay), including FIU Arena and at the FIU Football Stadium.
About FIU: Florida International University is recognized as a Carnegie engaged university. Its colleges and schools offer more than 180 bachelor¹s, master¹s and doctoral programs in fields such as engineering, international relations, architecture, law and medicine. As one of South Florida's anchor institutions, FIU is Worlds Ahead in its local and global engagement, finding solutions to the most challenging problems of our time. FIU emphasizes research as a major component of its mission. FIU has awarded 200,000 degrees and enrolls 50,000 students in two campuses and three centers including FIU Downtown on Brickell and the Miami Beach Urban Studios. FIU is a member of Conference USA and has 400 student-athletes participating in 18 sports. For more information about FIU, visit http://www.fiu.edu/.
