Red Wolves Rally To Stun Ragin' Cajuns, 71-69

JONESBORO, Ark. – Sean Gardner's three-point play with 7.6 seconds remaining helped Arkansas State rally from a 13-point deficit in the second half and edge the Louisiana Ragin' Cajuns, 71-69, in a Sun Belt Conference contest Saturday night at the Convocation Center.

Devin Carter scored a team-high 25 points and Donte Thomas added 20 as Arkansas State (8-7, 4-0 SBC) won its fifth straight game. Shawn Long scored 25 points and grabbed 15 rebounds for Louisiana (5-8, 1-3 SBC) as he became the Sun Belt Conference's all-time leading rebounder.

"We didn't get the bounce we needed at the end," head coach Bob Marlin said. "We played a really good start of the second half … played good the whole game, actually. But we needed to rebound a free throw. At the end of the first half, I told the guys that you were going to make a 3-pointer, we executed, we did exactly what we wanted. Shawn got a great look but it didn't go in."

Louisiana held a 69-68 lead as Long made one of two free throws with 33.6 seconds remaining before Carter was fouled on the Red Wolves' next possession. Carter missed both free throws, but Frederic Dure grabbed the rebound and Gardner would score his only bucket of the half to give Arkansas State the lead for good.

The Ragin' Cajuns had a chance to win on their final possession, but Long's 3-point attempt from the top of the key bounced off the iron.

Louisiana built a 21-16 lead in the first half when Bryce Washington scored on a layup with 9:07 remaining. The Red Wolves chipped away at the lead and used an 8-1 run that was capped by a three-point play by Carter for a 38-31 lead with 5.6 seconds remaining before Hayward Register's 3-pointer at the buzzer closed the game to 38-34.

The Ragin' Cajuns, who trailed 38-34 at halftime, opened the second half with a 17-0 run as Arkansas State missed its first 14 attempts from the floor. Long, who increased his career rebounding total to 1,196 and moved past former South Alabama standout Augustine Rubit (1,183 rebounds), gave Louisiana a 51-38 lead with a three-point play with 12:41 remaining in the game before Arkansas State scored its first point of the half on a Carter free throw with 11:58 left.

Louisiana led 64-57 when Kasey Shepherd drained a 3-pointer with 5:37 left before Carter scored all nine points in a 9-2 run that tied the game at 66-66 at the 2:05 mark. Shepherd added a pair of free throws with 1:13 left for a 68-66 lead before Thomas knotted the game for the sixth time in the second half with two free throws with 1:02 left.

Long, who moved past Rubit and Jacksonville's Ronnie Murphy into eighth-place on the Sun Belt's all-time scoring list, finished 9-for-25 from the floor, 7-for-11 from the free throw line while blocking a pair of shots. Stove and Devonta Walker added nine points each for Louisiana, which finished 26-for-66 (39.4 percent) from the floor.

Gardner added 13 points for the Red Wolves, who snapped a five-game losing streak to Louisiana and improved to 4-0 in league play for the first time since 2000-01.

Louisiana will return to action on Thursday, Jan. 14, when it visits Georgia Southern (5-9, 1-3 SBC) in a 6:30 p.m. CT contest in Statesboro, Ga. The game will be televised on ESPN3.

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Team Stats

Shawn Long

Devonta Walker

Johnathan Stove

Steven Wronkoski

Players Mentioned

Shawn Long

Hayward Register

Kasey Shepherd

Devonta Walker

Bryce Washington