Flames stun Chants on late 3-pointer to pull off upset

Well, Cliff Ellis had said it leading into Coastal Carolina’s clash with Liberty on Wednesday night, that it didn’t matter what the Flames’ record was or what had happened to this point for either team – a rivalry game is a rivalry game.

And in this case, it really was more than a cliche.

The Flames had yet to defeat a Division I opponent before their visit to The HTC Center, but after hanging around just close enough for most of the game they took their first lead with a little more than three minutes remaining and later stole the game on a John Dawson 3-pointer with 14 seconds to go for a 62-61 win.

“It didn’t surprise me because it’s Liberty and Coastal. It’s just been that way forever. You just go at each other, and that’s just the way that it is,” Ellis said. “Shades of the tournament a few years ago. It’s just Liberty and Coastal – when you go at it, you go at it. You don’t know what’s going to happen. Like Coastal and Winthrop. Throw the record books out.”

Coastal Carolina (8-7, 2-3 Big South) was coming off its most impressive performance of the season after rolling to a 19-point win over conference contender Winthrop on Saturday, and it looked at several points in the second half Wednesday that the Chants had finally seized the momentum for good.

But Liberty (4-13, 1-3), which had lost its previous 12 games, just kept hitting big shots.

Dawson, who had to sit out the first semester after transferring from Marquette mid-season last year, had come in shooting 45.0 percent from 3-point range over his first five games and led the Flames on Wednesday night with a game-high 18 points while connecting on 4-of-10 3-point attempts. He hit three of those 3s in the final 3:07 to make the difference.

Junior guard Elijah Wilson led Coastal Carolina with 15 points and eight rebounds in the loss, while senior forward Tristian Curtis finished with nine points and seven boards.

The Chants had won the last three meetings in the series – including a 96-56 win here last year – but the Flames earned a big victory in what could be the final meeting for a while between the teams with Coastal Carolina moving to the Sun Belt Conference next season.

“We put a full 40 minutes together. We’ve had segments of games where we’ve been decent and looked kind of like that, but one thing has led to another and we break down,” Liberty coach Ritchie McKay said. “At Princeton, we had some chances; at Saint Francis, we had some chances. We just haven’t put it together for a full 40. This team has a lot of character so eventually you thought we were going to break through, but to do it against as quality an opponent and coaching staff and players as they have, it’s a good win for us.”

Coastal Carolina led 31-26 at halftime and pushed that lead to 38-28 early in the second half, but Liberty kept firing form the outside and delivering big shots.

With 4:10 left, junior point guard Shivaughn Wiggins went to the line and knocked down 1-of-2 free throws to give the Chants a 52-47 lead as it looked like they may start pulling away again. But Liberty’s Evan Maxwell followed with a basket and free throw and Dawson then drained a 3 from the left wing to give the Flames their first lead at 53-52.

Coastal Carolina answered right back with Wilson following two of his own misses with a make, Curtis then getting to the line and hitting 1-of-2 free throws and sophomore guard Jaylen Shaw dropping in a baseline jumper for a 57-53 lead with a little less than two minutes left to play.

But it was Dawson again, draining a 3 from the left side to keep the visitors in it. After a nice drive and basket from Wilson, Lovell Cabbil hit a 3 from the right wing for Liberty to tie the game at 59-59.

With 40.8 seconds to go, Wilson again scored on a nice layup while drawing the foul. He missed the ensuing free throw, though, leaving the Chants’ lead at 61-59.

And with a wide-open look from the top of the arc Dawson connected on another 3 with 14 seconds left.

“I should have knocked down that free throw and we’d still be out there playing right now,” Wilson said afterward. “It’s a learning point not for only us, but for me – free throws count, they really matter especially at the end of the game. So take this and learn, and tomorrow in the gym I’m going to have to shoot some extra free throws at the end of practice.”

Wiggins brought the ball up court and drove to the basket for the Chants’ final look, but it didn’t go down. Ellis opted not to call timeout there because he felt confident with Wiggins attacking the defense.

“The school of thought there is at times, you can either call a timeout and set something up, but it also gives them a chance to adjust and change something,” Ellis said. “It looked like Shivaughn may have waved it off, I don’t know, but his body language [was saying] ‘Let’s keep playing.’ And I just felt, many times over the course of a career, you just sometimes let those guys go and do what they need to do. What we tried to do is get the ball to the rack, they squeezed it out and we just didn’t make the shot at the end.”

Overall, Liberty was 12-of-33 from 3-point range and won despite Coastal Carolina earning a 35-26 rebounding advantage. Albeit, the Chants’ 12 turnovers didn’t help (compared to seven for the Flames).

Liberty is struggling through growing pains this season with a young roster that returned very little experience from last year, but the Flames look to have some nice pieces to build around. Dawson is only a sophomore, freshman guard Caleb Homesley added 12 points in the win and fellow freshman guard Cabbil finished with 11 points, four assists, six rebounds and five steals.

Coastal Carolina, meanwhile, will look to bounce back as it heads on the road for a game Saturday at Longwood.

“Their energy was much better than ours in the first half so give them credit where it’s due,” Curtis said. “No surprise, just that we should have played smashmouth basketball from the get-go instead of playing so passive in the first half. But the second half both teams came out hard and they came out with the win. ... It stinks, but we’ve got to live with it. We’ve just got to learn.”

This story was originally published January 6, 2016 at 10:11 PM with the headline "Flames stun Chants on late 3-pointer to pull off upset."