LYNCHBURG, Va. ? UNC Asheville's Sean Smith scored a
career high 28 points and tied a school record with eight 3-pointers, but his stellar performance was
not enough to lift the Bulldogs over Liberty in a 78-66 victory by the
Flames.
Liberty
(16-17, 7-4 BSC) was led by freshman sensation Seth Curry with 17 points. However, Curry only managed to hit five of
his 20 shots and was one-of-nine from behind the three point arc. Kyle Ohman scored 16 points and Anthony Smith
tallied 15.
Matt Dickey was the Bulldogs' (9-13, 5-6 BSC) second leading
scorer with 12 points. John Williams
scored nine points and also pulled down nine rebounds.
Smith paced Liberty
in the first half. The senior guard came
out firing as he tallied seven of the Flames' first nine points. Smith finished the first half with 12 points.
With seven minutes remaining in the first half, the Flames
went on a 17-5 run that allowed them to enter halftime with a 43-27 lead.
Sean Smith scored three 3-pointers in the first half, but he
really started to catch fire in the second half and helped the Bulldogs claw
back into the game.
At the 16:09 mark, Smith hit a three to cut the Flames lead
to 10 (59-49). On the Bulldogs'
following possession, he hit another three that decreased the Liberty lead to seven (59-52).
Eric Stubbs scored a lay-up with 5:14 left in the game to
make the score 62-56. Smith nailed his
eighth three-pointer of the game at the 4:42 mark. His eight threes tie the Asheville single-game
record set by Josh Kohn against Winthrop
in the 1993-94 season.
Anthony Smith hit one-of-two foul shots with 4:08 remaining
to bring the score to 63-59 in Liberty's
favor.
The Bulldogs responded on the next possession with another
lay-up by Stubbs that cut the Liberty
lead to two (63-61). The Bulldogs could not get any closer as the
Flames closed out the game with a 15-5 run in the last three and a half minutes
of the contest.
“We battled hard,” said head coach Eddie Biedenbach. “Some of our key players didn't play as well
as usual and it was too difficult to overcome our 21 turnovers.”
Asheville wraps up its Virginia road trip Monday night against league leaders VMI in Cameron Hall. Tipoff is at 7 p.m.
Liberty
hosts Gardner-Webb Tuesday at 7 p.m in the Vines Center.
