Charlotte 49ers survive Middle Tennessee rally for Conference USA victory

Charlotte 49ers basketball coach Ron Sanchez isn’t going to concern himself with how his team looks when it wins a game.

A win, after all, is a win.

“Every win is pretty, especially in this building,” Sanchez said after the 49ers held off Middle Tennessee 68-62 in a Conference USA game Saturday in Halton Arena. “It’s not the prettiest. It’s not the sexiest. It’s a ‘W.’ Every win for this team is a sexy win. And this is a good win.”

It was a hard-earned win, is what it was. Charlotte got 15 points from freshman Jahmir Young and a career-high 14 from sophomore Luka Vasic. It’s the 49ers’ first 2-0 start in Conference USA since they rejoined the league in 2013-14.

The 49ers (8-5, 2-0 C-USA), leading by as many as 22 points in the second half, saw that margin vanish under an avalanche of Blue Raiders 3-pointers. Middle Tennessee (4-11, 0-2) hit 3-pointers on four consecutive possessions and tied it 54-54 on a 3-pointer by C.J. Jones with 5 minutes, 32 seconds left.

The 49ers took control again after that and — helped by a blocked layup attempt by Charlotte guard Drew Edwards on Jones that would have cut the lead to one-point — eked out the victory.

“There a lot of lessons to be learned from this game,” said Sanchez. “We knew they’d make a run at some point, we just didn’t know when it was coming. Part of it is managing the flows of the game. When you have an inexperienced group,the emotions of the game impact how you make certain mistakes. And we made a lot of mistakes down the stretch.”

Still, playing without leading scorer Jordan Shepherd (hamstring) for a second consecutive game, the 49ers steadied themselves enough to escape.

“It was just defense,” said sophomore guard Cooper Robb, who scored 10 points and led the 49ers with six rebounds. “Coach just kept saying to reset as the main thing and to focus on the things that we should be doing right — guard the ball and rebound.”

Getting a boost off the bench from Vasic, Charlotte broke open a close game midway through the first half. After the Blue Raiders had cut the lead to 11-9 on a basket by Donovan Sims with 12 minutes, 2 seconds left, the 49ers went on a 27-12 run to close the half.

Vasic, who missed last season with a knee injury, scored all of his points in the first half, which eclipsed his career high by one point.

Charlotte, which was holding opponents to 41.9 percent shooting entering the game, limited the Blue Raiders to 26.9 percent in the first half. Sims’ 20 led the Blue Raiders and Jones had 16.

And one

The Blue Raiders’ 21 first-half points were the third consecutive half Charlotte had held an opponent to less than 30 points (22 in each half Thursday against Ala.-Birmingham). The Blue Raiders nearly doubled that in the second half, scoring 41.

Lane violation

Charlotte had six turnovers over the game’s first 6 minutes. The 49ers, who were seemingly in panic mode during Middle Tennessee’s comeback, finished with 17.

ICYMI

The last time the 49ers started 2-0 in conference play was in 2012-13, when the 49ers were in the Atlantic 10. Charlotte finished 21-12 that season and played in the National Invitation Tournament (losing to Providence in the first round). That’s also the last time the 49ers played in the postseason.

Making sense of the numbers

3: Fast-break points by Middle Tennessee. (Charlotte had five).

5: 49ers in double figures (Young 15, Vasic 14, Bamba Amidou 11, Robb 10, Malik Martin 10).

9: Consecutive Charlotte losses against Middle Tennessee prior to Saturday (the last victory against the Blue Raiders was Dec. 13, 1987).

30: Rebounds by each team.

This story was originally published January 4, 2020 at 6:52 PM.