Anderson rallies Paladins past Western Carolina

Nick Anderson scored 30 points to help Furman rally to an 84-75
overtime win over Western Carolina. Photo courtesy of Furman

With one month left in the regular season, teams in the middle of the pack in the Southern Conference really can't afford a home loss to a team near the bottom if they hope to avoid the Friday "play-in" games at the SoCon Tournament. Furman was staring down the barrel of that possibility with less than three minutes to play Wednesday night on the campus of Bob Jones University. Then "find a way Furman" found a way.

Wednesday's "way" turned out to be Nick Anderson. Over the final 2:17 of regulation, Anderson accounted for one-third of Furman's made three-pointers before making the game-tying layup to force overtime. He added another three in overtime and helped the Paladins finally make clutch free throws. Anderson personally outscored Western Carolina 19-12 over the final 7:17 as Furman rallied for an 84-75 win.

"I thought Western Carolina played with a tremendous amount of confidence tonight. They had a great plan, but give our guys credit. ... We ended up putting Nick at point and let him start playing off those middle ball screens and it saved the day for us," Coach Bob Richey said on the Furman Radio Network's postgame show. "We were just kind of puttering along, but put him in that middle screen action and rode it through overtime. Then we got some stops with that small lineup and got the victory. ... Now we've been in 12 one-possession games (at the end of regulation) and we're 10-2 in those.

"It was a weird game analytically. We hit almost every metric that we try to go into a game with. We got over 30 deflections, had seven kills (three defensive possessions in a row without allowing points) and made more free throws than they attempted. ... It just felt like a tractor pull all night."

With 2:27 left in regulation, Western's Marcus Kell hit a pair of free throws to push the Catamounts lead to 63-57. It also gave Kell a career-high 29 points - 18 more than anyone else at that point. Little did anyone know then that Kell wouldn't be the game's leading scorer.

Anderson drained a three-pointer with 2:17 left and 44 seconds later, he hit another to tie the game at 63-63. With seven seconds left, Anderson drove in for a layup to tie the game 66-66 and that led to overtime after Western's Brandon Morgan missed a three at the buzzer.

After missing his first free throw in overtime, Anderson made each of his next six including the first four points of the extra session. He later added a layup to push the lead to seven with 2:23 left, then sealed the win on a three-pointer with 32 seconds left to cap his Furman career-high 30-point night.

"Props to my teammates and coach for just believing in me, giving me the confidence in myself to go out there and make those (late) plays," said Anderson. "Luckily, I was able to hit them and we were able to grind out a much-needed W."

It was an odd game of runs, completely different from the first meeting in Cullowhee on New Year's Day when Furman (18-6, 6-5 Southern Conference) dominated from start to finish in a 90-61 win. On Wednesday, the Paladins raced out to a 15-8 lead before the Catamounts (6-16, 2-9) responded with a 14-0 run. Western took a 33-31 lead into halftime and led by as many as eight in the second half before the Paladins rallied.

Tom House delivered a big three off the bench in overtime just ahead of Anderson's layup. and PJay Smith connected on all four of his free throws over the final 1:12 of the game. As a team, the Paladins connected on 10-of-13 foul shots in overtime after making just 8-of-15 in the second half. Furman finished with a season-high 24 made free throws out of 35 attempts. The 68.6 percent average isn't quite where Richey would like to see Furman routinely shoot, but it was a huge improvement over the previous three games in which it made a combined 27-of-51.

Furman overcame a night in which it shot only 41.3 percent (26-of-63), including 8-of-29 (27.6 percent) from three, with defense and ball protection. Western was held to 33.3 percent shooting (24-of-72) and the Paladins had just seven turnovers. Even though the Catamounts had a 19-14 advantage in offensive rebounds, Furman had a 13-8 edge in second-chance points.

The starting lineup changed when Charles Johnston made his first Furman start and Garrett Hien came off the bench. Hien responded in a big way with 13 points, 15 rebounds, two assists, one steal and no turnovers.

"I knew he would respond. It wasn't anything punitive. It was just to be able to sub him in at the 5 and get in the flow of the game," Richey said. "I thought you could see when we were playing him out at the high post, it looked like the good old days of our offense. We hit a couple of back cuts early and I thought we got a little bit more movement with him up there at the 5."

In addition to his 30-point night, Anderson also had three steals and three assists. Smith finished with 15 points, five rebounds, four assists, one block and one steal also for the Paladins.

In addition to his 29-point night, Kell had eight rebounds, two blocks, one steal and no turnovers. Western leading scorer Bernard Pelote was 4-of-17 from the floor, but finished with 13 points, 13 rebounds and two steals.