Led by 29 points from senior Ryan Montgomery, including an electrifying breakaway dunk, the Lee men's basketball team made it 10 straight wins knocking off No. 13 Alabama Huntsville, 65-60 on Saturday afternoon in Walker Arena.
Montgomery soared high above the rim and hammered it home with his right-hand to give the Flames their largest lead of the game, 49-25 with 14:06 remaining in the game.
The Chargers would make things interesting late with a 21-5 run over the final 6:32 but the Flames made a few crucial defensive stops late and cashed in at the foul line to seal the Gulf South Conference victory.
"Ryan's a special player. He has taken over games for us and he certainly did that today. He and Parker (Suedekum) have done a great job leading us this season," said Lee head coach Bubba Smith.Â
The Flames took a 30-23 lead into halftime thanks to a broken play lay in at the buzzer by Jayce Willingham off a pass from Kentrell Evans.
Out of the break Lee went on a 19-2 run to put the game away with Montgomery's dunk providing the exclamation point on the six-minute stretch.
The usually efficient Charger offense was limited to just 38.6 percent shooting and connected on just 6 of 24 (25 percent) from the 3-point line. The Flames shot 47 percent from the field and went 10 of 28 (35.7 percent) from downtown.
"We haven't gotten out to many 20-plus point leads this season because the league is so balanced. It can be tough to maintain those leads because you know good teams are going fight back but I thought we did a nice job of not panicking and getting stops when we needed them and staying aggressive defensively even when we weren't hitting shots," added Smith.
Montgomery finished 10 of 19 from the field and hit four triples. Freshman Beyuan Hendricks scored nine points, grabbed seven rebounds and had four assists. Quay Kennedy pitched in six points while Evans dished off a game-high six assists.
"This is a good win. Their a tough team. They make shots and they guard but we had to come out and play our game," said Montgomery. "I just kept telling the guys to get stops when they were going on that run in the second half and we got the job done. Our coaches have put together great game plans and we have such an unselfish team and we go out there each night and execute and we just need to stick to that plan moving forward."
Max Shulman came off the bench to lead Alabama Huntsville with 15 points and nine rebounds. Seth Swalve tallied 11 and Sam Orf scored 10.
With the win the Flames improve to 12-3 and are 7-1 in the GSC. The loss drops the Chargers to 13-3 and 5-3 in the league.
Next up for the Flames is a tough road trip to Montevallo and West Alabama next week. Lee visits the GSC-leading Falcons (11-4, 7-0) on Thursday at 8:30 p.m. before traveling to the Tigers (12-3, 5-2) on Saturday at 5 p.m.
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