North Alabama used a strong second-half effort to pull away for a 73-66 road win over Jacksonville State on Monday.
The visiting Lions trailed by eight points heading into halftime, but outscored Jax State 47-32 in the second half to secure the victory.
Junior Canin Jefferson led the comeback effort with 14 of his 16 points coming in the second half, while Donte Bacchus added 12 in the second half to lead UNA to its first road win of the year.
Bacchus finished with 19 points and nine rebounds to lead the Lions’ scoring efforts, and Corneilous Williams grabbed a game-high 13 rebounds and scored 17 points.
North Alabama has now won three of the last four matchups against the Gamecocks. Jax State leads the overall series 59-38 in a rivalry that dates back to the 1949-50 season.
“Our guys today just stayed the course the whole time,” North Alabama coach Tony Pujol said on the radio broadcast following the win. “They locked into the scouting report — I thought they did a tremendous job there — and I thought what they did was they just had a no-quit mentality. It was great in the huddles.
“They just stayed positive the whole time, good or bad, they just stayed positive.”
The Gamecocks were held to a 12-for-35 mark from the field in the second half and just made three of their 16 shots from beyond the arc after going 6-for-9 from 3-point range in the first half of the matchup.
Jamar Franklin led Jax State to a first-half lead with 13 points, going 4-for-5 from 3-point range. Tulsa transfer Jaye Nash also dished out five of his eight assists in the first half of the matchup.
Louisiana transfer Mostapha El Moutaouakkil totaled 19 points — 15 in the second half — to lead Jax State in the loss, with Alabama A&M transfer AC Bryant scoring 18 points and logging a game-high eight rebounds.
“Whenever you’re playing a team that’s coached by coach Harper, you have to be ready,” Pujol said of Jax State. “You’re always going to get not only a coach that understands the game and coaches at a high level, but his players play to their identity, which is that they’re going to play hard, they’re going to really grind games out. If you’re not ready for that, they can make you look pretty bad.”
The Lions got their first lead of the second half on a 3-pointer from Tank Washington with 10:05 left to play before a 3-pointer from Bryant and a pair of free throws from Phenix City native Jacoby Hill.
After a back-and-forth period that saw four lead changes, a layup from Bacchus with 2:53 left to play gave the Lions a lead they never lost; Coffee Springs native Dallas Howell hit a 3-pointer a little over a minute later.
“We came in here with high energy and just stuck together,” Bacchus said. “Every day, this is brick by brick, just coming every day in practice, just competing and staying up, and it just paid off. I’m happy we were able to get this win and just stay together.”
North Alabama (4-4) will face San Francisco on Wednesday at 9 p.m. in California. Jax State (3-4) will host Division II AUM on Sunday at 4 p.m. at Pete Mathews Coliseum. Both games will be streamed on ESPN+.
