CARROLLTON, Ga. – Despite a valiant second half comeback led by the hot shooting of senior Cody Jones the Lee men's basketball team came up just short, falling to West Georgia 77-74 on Saturday afternoon.
Jones scored 20 points connecting on 6 of 8 3-pointers and had 10 rebounds. He hit five triples in the second half, the last of which gave the Flames a 69-61 lead with 5:53 remaining.
From there however the Wolves closed the game on a 16-5 run to survive with the victory. Marquill Smith hit two foul shots with the game tied and 13 seconds remaining. The Flames then committed a costly turnover and were forced to foul with six seconds left. West Georgia's Aren Ulmer split a pair at the line but the Flames last second shot to tie came up empty.
Colton Blevins led the Flames with 23 points and four rebounds. Parker Suedekum added nine points and Leander Ridgeway Jr. added eight points and five boards off the bench.
The Wolves jumped out to an 11-point lead at the half thanks to a half court bank shot from Laperion Perry. West Georgia closed on a 14-4 run and led 39-28.
Smith led the West Georgia with 27 points and seven rebounds. Michael Zabetakis added 13 and Willie Barnes scored 13 on 5 of 6 shooting from the field in 17 minutes off the bench.
"We have to be ready to play for 40 minutes. You give a team 11 points at the half sometimes it's tough to overcome. They hit the long shot there at the end of half and we'd certainly like that one back," said Lee head coach Bubba Smith. "I proud of how our guys battled back and took the lead but you get to the end of the game and you need to get a couple of stops and makes on the other end and credit West Georgia, they executed better than we did in the final moments."
Lee shot 45.5 percent from the field and despite just hitting 1 of 9 from the 3-point line in the first half improved to 6 of 12 in the second half to pull back into the contest. The Flames were efficient at the foul connecting on 17 of 20 (85 percent). The Wolves hit 44.3 percent from the field and shot 6 of 22 (27.3 percent) from beyond the arc.
In the fight playoff seeding the Flames sit in seventh as they fall to 14-13 and 11-8 in the GSC. They currently are tied with Union but hold the tiebreaker after winning both head to head matchups. The Wolves are 12-7 and currently tied with Delta State for fifth place.
The Flames will close out the regular season on Thursday as they host rival Shorter in Walker Arena at 8 p.m.
"We want to make sure we have a good week of preparation and have good momentum heading into the tournament," concluded Smith.
