FARMVILLE, Va. – On a day when emotions ran high well before tipoff, Charleston Southern used a pair of 20-point games from Cortez Mitchell and Armel Potter to outlast Longwood's furious second-half rally and spoil Darrion Allen and Issac Belton's Senior Day with an 86-78 win over the Lancers Saturday afternoon in Willett Hall.
 
The Buccaneers used a monstrous first half to build a 22-point lead, but Longwood (6-23, 3-5 Big South), led by a game-high 27 points from Khris Lane, 23 from Allen and a season-high 14 from Belton, stormed back to cut that deficit to just one point with 6:24 left in the game. That late surge featured a 38-19 Longwood run with 17 of those points coming from Lane.
 
Following a timeout, however, Charleston Southern (11-18, 7-11) mounted a 20-13 run of its own and scored eight points from the free throw line in the final 1:04 to pull away to their third win in the past four games.
 
"I was pretty emotional to begin with," said Belton, who, along with Allen, was joined on the court by his mother and father for a special Senior Day ceremony. "I tried not to show it, but once the game started, I stopped thinking about it. I was just focused on trying to get a win. I told the guys before the game not to play for me, play to get the win. We showed a lot of heart and battled back in the second half. We just didn't make enough plays."
 
After entering the locker room at halftime with a 20-point deficit, the Lancers took control for more than 13 minutes of the second half and mounted the 38-19 rally to cut Charleston Southern's lead to 66-65. The Lancers forced the Buccaneers into three turnovers and just 6-of-21 shooting from the floor during that stretch while countering on the offensive by scoring on 18 of 23 possessions.
 
It was Big South freshman scoring leader Christian Keeling who turned the tide back in Charleston Southern's favor, however, as he scored four straight points after a timeout to extend the lead back to two possessions. Those four straight points were part of a 12-point afternoon for Keeling and jump-started an 11-2 run that reclaimed an eight-point lead for the Bucs.
 
From there, Longwood, dressing just seven players with nearly half the roster out due to injury and illness, succumbed to both fatigue and foul trouble down the stretch. Both Lane and third-leading scorer Isaiah Walton fouled out in the final minute, while Belton and Chris Shields both played the final nine-plus minutes with four fouls each.
 
"I'm very, very proud our guys didn't give up or give in," said Longwood head coach Jayson Gee. "It says a lot about the character of our team, down 20 and able to fight back from that. I wish we could have come out with a W, but this team has shown that kind of resilience all year long."
 
The 23-point effort from Allen in his final home game in Willett Hall included seven rebounds and a perfect 8-of-8 performance from the free throw line. Belton, meanwhile, set a new season high with 14 points, scoring 10 of those after halftime by hitting three of his final four shots from the field.
 
"Their consistency and their attitude, and their ability to stay above water are all attributes they'll leave behind with us," Gee said of Allen and Belton, members of his first Longwood recruiting class and the two lone seniors on this year's squad.
 
"Their behavior and the way they carry themselves was a phenomenal model for our young guys. At the end of the day, that's going to last forever. Our young guys have unbelievable respect for DJ, unbelievable respect for Ike, and they saw the way they conducted themselves in every avenue of life. That's a model that's going to be a part of our program for a long time."
 
Allen and Belton will embark on their final postseason of their respective four-year Longwood careers Tuesday with a rematch against the eighth-seeded Buccaneers in the first round of the 2017 Big South Championship. With a win, the Lancers, who earned the No. 9 seed, will face No. 1 seed Winthrop Thursday in Rock Hill, S.C.
 
"We have to forget the past," Allen said. "It's a totally different mindset. Everybody's 0-0 going into the tournament, and it's win or go home. I don't care how many points I score. Taking home a championship, that's a successful tournament for me."

 
 
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