BIRMINGHAM, Ala. - The Samford men's basketball team continued its hot streak with an 83-75 win over the Furman Paladins Wednesday evening in the Pete Hanna Center.
 
The Bulldogs have now won nine of their last 10 games, and their season record improves to 20-9 overall and 10-7 in Southern Conference play, moving into sole possession of third place in the SoCon standings. This marks Samford's first 20-win season since 2016-17, and the first time the Bulldogs have won 20 games in the regular season since 1998-99. This is also just the third 20-win regular season in the Division I history of the program. The 10 conference wins are the most since Samford joined the SoCon in 2008-09.
 
"We played at their place earlier this season and we were down by 30 at halftime to start league play," Samford head coach Bucky McMillan said. "After that, we went 1-6 to start the league. Tell me how many teams would have packed it in and said we just don't have it. But since then, we've won nine out of 10 and beaten every team in the league now and we're playing our best basketball. That talks about staying the course, and you saw that in this game."
 
Samford was led in the game by Ques Glover with 22 points and six assists. Logan Dye had 19 points and six rebounds. Jermaine Marshall had 16 points and nine rebounds. Jaden Campbell added 12 points for the Bulldogs.
 
For Furman, Mike Bothwell had 21 points and six rebounds. Alex Hunter had 16 points, Marcus Foster had 12 points and Jalen Slawson added 10 points.
 
After Samford scored the first four points of the game, Furman went on an 8-0 run to take an 8-4 lead with 15:35 to go in the first half after a three-pointer by Hunter. Samford then came back to take an 11-8 lead with 13:38 to go in the first half after a layup by Dye. With Samford leading, 16-14, Furman went on a 7-2 run to take a 21-18 lead at the 8:59 mark in the first half following a layup by Hunter.
 
The Bulldogs fought back to take a 22-21 lead with 7:00 to go in the opening half after a layup by Dye. After Furman tied the score at 22-22, Samford scored the next five points to take a 27-22 lead with 5:58 to go in the first half following a three-pointer by Glover. After Furman cut the lead to 27-26, the Bulldogs pushed the lead back out to 31-26 with 3:53 to go in the half after a free throw by Glover. Samford took a 36-34 lead into the locker room at halftime.
 
Early in the second half, Furman took a 42-40 lead with 17:23 to go after a layup by Conley Garrison. With Samford trailing 49-46, the Bulldogs went on a 9-0 run to take a 55-49 lead after a three-point play by Marshall at the 13:37 mark in the second half. Samford pushed its lead to 60-52 with 11:45 to play after a layup by Jacob Tryon.
 
After Furman came back to cut the lead to 68-65, Samford went on an 8-0 run to take a 76-65 lead after two free throws by Campbell with 2:17 to go in the game. The Paladins came back to cut the lead to 77-75 with 33 seconds left after a pair of free throws by Foster. Marshall then hit two free throws for Samford with 32 seconds to go to push the lead to 79-75. Marshall then hit two more free throws with 22 seconds left to make the score 81-75. A layup by Glover with two seconds left made the final score 83-75.
 
Samford will wrap up its regular season with a game at Chattanooga Saturday. The game is set for a 3 p.m. (CT) start from Chattanooga's McKenzie Arena.   





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