HIGH POINT, N.C. –
Isaiah Walton got onto Longwood's team bus Tuesday evening and high-fived his head coach
Jayson Gee. That's when Gee knew something was different about his leading scorer.
"He never does that," Gee said. "He was just ready to go at a whole new level."
Two hours later, Walton unleashed that new-found energy on the No. 7 seed High Point Panthers and sparked the underdog Lancers (7-25) to a 68-55 upset win in the first round of the 2018 Big South Championship on High Point's home floor.
Walton finished with 14 points as part of a team-wide effort that earned the No. 10 seed Lancers a trip to the tournament quarterfinals where they will face No. 2 seed Radford Thursday at 1 p.m. in Asheville, N.C.
"I thought Isaiah's mentality and spirit had a domino effect on our team," Gee said. "It made a difference and set the tone. After the game when we went into the locker room, he told everyone he knew we were going to do this. He played with that kind of resiliency and toughness tonight. His attitude just permeated throughout the team."
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From the opening tipoff when Walton bolted into High Point's backcourt to contest the first possession of the game, Longwood threw relentless pressure at the Panthers and staked a 25-7 lead just over 10 minutes into the game. Longwood led by as many as 18 points and no fewer than seven the rest of the way, using a harassing defense to force the Panthers into 17 turnovers and hold them to their fewest points on their home court in the Millis Center all season.
"I talked to them in the locker room Sunday, and I said two words: That's enough," Gee said. "The underachievement, the mentality, the lack of effort – all on me as a coach – had to be over. To their credit, these guys really pulled together and did that."
Walton and fellow backcourt veterans
B.K. Ashe and
Charles Glover were central to that resurgence, with all three scoring in double figures and combining for nine of Longwood's season-high 15 fast-break points. Glover matched Walton with 14 points and added two assists and a steal, while Ashe scored 12 and chipped in two steals and a block on the defensive end.
Ashe and Glover, the lone senior Lancers, shared the same tenacity that grabbed hold of Walton, and as a result guaranteed themselves least one more game in their final season of college basketball together.
"We're hungry. Like a pack of wolves. We want to take this championship back to Farmville," said Glover, who won two Northeast Conference titles at Mount St. Mary's before transferring to Longwood as a graduate student this season.
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Sporting stitches in his upper lip from a blow he received in the regular-season finale against Radford on Saturday, Glover took the baton from Walton late emerged as the heartbeat of the team down the stretch, diving for loose balls, ripping down rebounds and hitting clutch shots at multiple key moments in the game.
After High Point cut Longwood's lead to seven points with 10:03 remaining, it was Glover who picked off a pass in the lane, ran it back up the court and finished with a layup over the outstretched arms of High Point's 6-7 forward and blocks leader Justyn Mutts.
High Point would then cut Longwood's lead back to 10 points with five minutes to play, but it was Glover who put the Lancers on his back, scoring a team-high six points and grabbing a team-high three rebounds the rest of the way.
"It was a complete team effort, defensively and offensively," Glover said. "That's what kept us going. That's what kept the momentum with us, and it's what won us the game."
Longwood also got major contributions from redshirt junior and fourth-year team captain
Damarion Geter, who scored eight points, grabbed six boards and stuffed the stat sheet with three steals, three assists and a pair of blocks.
JaShaun Smith joined Geter in the starting lineup and added eight points, while junior forward
Spencer Franklin scored nine points and freshman reserve
Jordan Cintron delivered three steals in 17 minutes off the bench.
"I said to them in the locker room, this is who you are," Gee said. "This is the team we wanted to see and felt like we could really progress with.
Spencer Franklin was incredible in the first half.
Jordan Cintron was great.
Isaiah Walton played with great toughness. Geter, I mean come on, he's just a winner. I'm just very, very proud of our guys."
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That team-wide effort allowed Longwood to turn the tables on High Point after the Panthers took both regular-season meetings by a combined 39 points. Gee also credited his staff – specifically associate head coach
Jake Luhn – with installing the necessary adjustments to avoid a repeat of those two losses.
"Coach Luhn, who's a lot smarter than me, came to me and said we have to change up how we guard them," Gee said. "This was his scout, and he convinced me that we needed to switch the screens and really deny passing lanes and increase our physicality.
"It was his scouting report, his ingenuity, his forethought and his preparation that got us ready to win this game."
Now Longwood has less than 48 hours to travel from High Point to Asheville for Thursday afternoon's quarterfinal matchup against Radford. In Asheville, Longwood will join the eight remaining teams in the tournament, which will take place on the home court of regular-season champion and No. 1 tournament seed UNC Asheville.
The winner of Thursday's game against Radford will move on to the semifinals where they will face the winner of No. 3 seed Winthrop and No. 6 seed Gardner-Webb.
"We plan on transitioning this to Asheville," Gee said. "Even though no one's expecting us at the party, we're gonna crash it."
#GoWood
