CHARLESTON, S.C. – In closing the book on 2018, Longwood made sure to write an explosive final chapter.
 
Backed by a near triple-double from Shabooty Phillips and a season-high 29 points from Isaiah Walton, the Lancers (10-5) punctuated a historic 2018 with yet another milestone, reaching 10 wins faster than any team in the program's Division I era with a 110-94 takedown of The Citadel Saturday afternoon at McAlister Field House.
 
The Citadel (9-3) entered the matchup as the nation's highest-scoring team, but Phillips and Walton countered with a combined 52 points to snap the Bulldogs' seven-game winning streak and hand them their first home loss of the season. Phillips finished with 23 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists, while Walton's 29 points sparked a 57-point effort from Longwood's bench.
 
The victory made the 2018-19 Lancers the program's fastest team to reach double-digit wins since the 2000-01 Lancers opened 10-1 as part of a 23-8 season at the Division II level.
 
The win also secured Longwood's best non-conference record since joining the Big South in 2012-13 and sends the Lancers into the start of Big South play on Jan. 5 as perhaps the Big South's biggest surprise, leading the league in both wins and winning percentage under first-year head coach Griff Aldrich.
 
"The guys the past few games are really starting to understand a little bit better what we're trying to do offensively. It's a process," said Aldrich, whose 10-5 start trails only Cal Luther's 11-4 start in 1981-82 and matches Dr. Ron Bash's 10-5 start in 1978-79 for the best by a first-year Longwood head coach.
 
"People talk about young teams a lot, and how it's hard for freshmen to come in and learn a system and things like that, and the reality is we have 15 freshmen in many regards because the system is new. That's something that some people don't always appreciate when they look at our team."
 
Longwood's team of "freshmen" hung a season-high 110 points on the Citadel and hit 16 three-pointers Saturday, following up a 77-63 win over Stetson on Dec. 21 in which they knocked down a season-high 17 treys. Walton hit 5-of-10 Saturday, Phillips hit 5-of-8 and redshirt freshman Juan Munoz knocked down 3-of-5. In total, six Lancers hit from beyond the arc, and Phillips assisted on five treys to give the Lancers at least 12 three-pointers for the fourth time in the past six games.
 
The 110 points marked Longwood's highest-scoring game since Dec. 12, 2011 when the Lancers routed VMI 110-89 in their final year as a Division I Independent. Ironically, the man on the sideline as VMI's head coach that night was Duggar Baucom, who is now the head coach of a Citadel team that entered Saturday's game averaging an NCAA-best 99.5 points per game.
 
Baucom's Bulldogs showcased their scoring prowess by becoming the first team to surpass the 90-point threshold against the Lancers this season. Point guard Lew Stallworth led that attack with 23 points and seven assists, and forward Zane Najdawi 17 points and 14 rebounds, while Matt Frierson and Kaiden Rice also scored in double figures and combined for nine three-pointers.
 
However, the Lancers countered by shooting a season-high .563 (36-of-64) from the floor, .500 (16-of-32) from three-point range and .880 (22-of-25) from the free throw line.
 
That shooting saved Longwood from folding in the second half when The Citadel overcame a 17-point deficit on the strength of a 34-14 run that started with 2:13 to play in the first half and led to a 63-60 lead with 14:01 left in the game. During that span, Frierson led the charge with 12 points as The Citadel hit 12-of-20 shots from the floor, six three-pointers and forced Longwood into seven turnovers.
 
"We got very tentative offensively," Aldrich said. "They pressed us, which they'd been doing the whole game, and it was almost as if we got scared and had a ton of turnovers all of a sudden. You can't do that against this team. They sense the timidity, and they turn the pressure up some. One of our philosophies offensively was once you break it, you have to attack them, and you're going to get what you want. I thought we did that.
 
That turnaround also saw The Citadel turn six offensive rebounds and seven Longwood turnovers into 18 points, including back-to-back treys by Frierson that tied the game at 60-60 and then put the Bulldogs ahead 63-60.
 
"There was a stretch right there, and it won't look pretty with me screaming at one of our players, but his man got two or three offensive rebounds," Aldrich said. "Up on our board was, 'If you want it, you'll go get it,' and [The Citadel] wanted it at that point. That's disappointing, and that can't be what Longwood basketball's all about. We've got to be the aggressor each and every time out."
 
That eight-plus minute run ignited The Citadel's home crowd, but Longwood's do-it-all point guard Phillips turned the tide by responding to Frierson's go-ahead three with a triple of his own, tying the game and sparking a 9-0 that put Longwood ahead the rest of the way. Jordan Cintron followed Phillips' trey with a three-point play, and Sean Flood hit another three, all within a span of 47 game-changing seconds.
 
"You may not be as skilled, your shot may not go in, the ball might go off the side of your foot. There are a lot of things you can't control, but your effort, your grit, and your toughness, that should never be second," Aldrich said. "If it is, I have a problem with that. A lot of our guys throughout the game did not struggle with that, and I thought that one stretch we could have done better."
 
Longwood went on to outscore The Citadel 50-31 over the game's final 13:36, committing just three turnovers and getting a combined 28 points from Phillips and Walton during that stretch.
 
"One of the main reasons we've been successful is their willingness to buy in and their willingness to give great effort," Aldrich said. "Have we been 100 percent consistent with that? No, but not many teams in the country have been. I'm extremely proud of these guys; we have a team we can all take pride in and look to continue to grow and develop."
 
Damarion Geter and Juan Munoz also added 12 points apiece for Longwood, which racked up a season-high 23 assists and got 57 points off the bench.
 
Longwood will now embark on a 16-game non-conference gauntlet that begins next Saturday, Jan. 5, at reigning Big South Champion Radford. That Commonwealth rivalry showdown will tip off at 4:30 p.m. on ESPN+.
 
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