PJay Smith's clutch corner triple with 37 seconds left lifted the Lee men's basketball team over the West Alabama Tigers, 66-63 on Saturday afternoon in Walker Arena.
The Flames held off a furious second half comeback from the talented Tigers, who made up a 13-point deficit to take a 51-50 lead with 4:58 remaining. Lee battled back to take the lead as Beyuan Hendricks cashed in 3-pointer to give the Flames a 59-56 advantage with 2:17 left. Hendricks finished with five points and four assists.
That set the stage for Smith's big shot and the Lee defense made it stick with a pair of stops in the final moments of the contest. Smith scored 12 points off the bench and grabbed five rebounds.
Jayce Willingham led the Flames with 19 points and six rebounds. Kennedy tallied 16 points and pulled in five rebounds. The Flames held a 32-30 advantage over the Tigers, who lead the Gulf South Conference in rebounding.
"Coach was encouraging me to be more aggressive and step up and I got a good look and made a big shot for my team," said Hendricks. "This when gives us confidence that we can finish down the stretch but we have to continue to put in the work and get better with each game."
The Flames limited the usually efficient West Alabama offense to just 32 percent shooting in the game. The Tigers did get to the foul line however and cashed in 20 of 21. Lee ended the contest 50 percent from the field after shooting 60 percent in the first half to open up a 13-pont lead.
"I thought we did a nice job defensively throughout the game," said Lee head coach Bubba Smith. "West Alabama is one of the most efficient offense teams in the country and are guys stepped up to make things tough on them. We need a to finish off a game like this. We've had some losses this season where we failed to close things out so I think this is a big step for us to withstand a punch from them and hold on to win it late."
Miles Kortrijik posted a double-double for the visiting Tigers with a game-high 27 points and 10 rebounds. Miles was a perfect 12 of 12 from the foul line.
The Flames improve to 9-5 overall and 5-3 in the GSC. The Tigers see their six-game winning streak snapped as they fall to 12-3 on the year and are 5-2. Lee has won three in a row over the Tigers and are 6-2 all time at Walker Arena in the series.
"We'll take this next week to get healthy and continue to get better in practice," concluded Smith. "We have proven to be resilient and bounce back this year after tough losses. That mindset will serve us well as we get into the grind of the GSC schedule."
Lee will take a week off before welcoming the Montevallo Falcons to Walker Arena next Saturday at 4 p.m.
