MONTEVALLO, Ala. – The Montevallo men's basketball team scraped by for a 69-67 over Mississippi College Sunday evening in Trustmark Arena. With the win, the Falcons improved to 4-6 and 2-0 in the Gulf South Conference, while the Choctaws fell to 3-6 and 1-2.
Junior guard James McNeil led the Falcons with 17 points, five rebounds, four steals, and two assists. Redshirt freshman forward
Mason Shifflett also provided critical minutes for UM, putting up 14 points with seven boards, and two steals.
Tradavis Thompson paced the Choctaws, finishing with 21 points.
Mississippi College held a slim 32-29 lead after a tightly contested first half. The largest lead of the first 20 minutes was five, 22-17, by MC with 5:46 left before the break.
The game remained tight, with the margin being no bigger than three points for either team. The Choctaws were up by a point at 54-53 when Shifflett knocked down a 3-pointer with 4:08 left to give UM a 56-54 lead. Shifflett's bomb ignited a 10-3 run for the Falcons. Shifflett followed up with a four point play two minutes later when he drained another shot from downtown and was fouled in the process. His freethrow gave the Falcons a 60-54 lead with 2:20 left. Shifflett added three more freethrows, the last two giving the Falcons their largest lead of the game at 63-54 with 1:45 remaining.
The Choctaws didn't give up, battling back to trim the UM lead to 66-62 with 25 seconds left. However, Shifflett hit a pair of freethrows and McNeil added another in the closing seconds to secure the win..
UP NEXT: Montevallo will face Delta State on Tuesday, December 14
th with tip off slated for 4:00 PM in Trustmark Arena.
