Box Score
CHARLOTTESVILLE, Va. – Assane Sene tipped in a missed free throw with 4.8 seconds left to help Virginia avoid a game upset bid by visiting Norfolk State on Monday night and give the Cavaliers a 50-49 victory at John Paul Jones Arena.
NSU (1-8) was poised to pull off one of the biggest wins in its Division I history and snap its six-game losing streak after Rob Hampton sank two free throws with 23.8 seconds remaining, giving the Spartans a 49-48 lead. At the other end, U.Va.'s Sammy Zeglinski missed a 3-pointer with nine seconds remaining and KT Harrell got the offensive rebound. Harrell was fouled by NSU's Aleek Pauline with 5.3 seconds left, but Harrell missed both free throws.
The second miss, however, hung up on the rim for a split second, causing Spartan post player Kyle O'Quinn to mistime his jump just slightly. The 7-foot Sene took advantage and tipped it in for his only points of the night.
The Spartans had one more chance to win, but Pauline missed a 3-pointer at the other end as time expired.
Neither team led by more than seven points in a low-scoring, defensive affair that served as the first-ever meeting between the teams. Hampton, who scored a team-high 17 points, scored the game's first bucket to give NSU its only lead of the first half. The Cavaliers answered with the next four points and didn't trail for the remainder of the half, but they needed a jumper by Mustapha Farrakhan to head into the half with a 22-20 edge. Both teams shot less than 30 percent in the opening stanza.
The Spartans would surge into the lead with an 11-3 run in the early going of the second half. The run was keyed by back-to-back 3-pointers by Radford transfer Chris McEachin, the second of which gave NSU a 32-30 edge with 13:12 remaining. O'Quinn capped the spurt with a traditional 3-point play to give the Spartans their biggest lead, at 35-30.
All told, there would be three ties and six lead-changes in the second half. The last tie was broken on a layup by Spartan wing player Rodney McCauley with 1:47 left. That put the Spartans ahead 47-45 and snapped a stretch of nearly four minutes without a point by either team.
NSU shot just 30.4 percent from the floor (17-of-56) for the night, but stayed in it with one of its better defensive efforts of the season. The Spartans held the Cavaliers to 50 points and 35.2 percent shooting (19-of-54), both season lows for an NSU opponent.
The Spartans also outrebounded U.Va. 42-36, led by 11 rebounds for O'Quinn. He added nine points, just missing his fifth straight double-double. McCauley (nine) and Hampton (seven) also contributed season highs in rebounds.
McEachin, a Norfolk native, scored 11 points in his NSU debut. He and Hampton were the only Spartans in double figures.
Farrakhan had a game-high 18 points and Harrell had nine for the Cavaliers. Sene led all players with 12 rebounds.
NSU looks to snap its losing streak this Thursday when it plays at Evansville at 8 p.m. ET.
