Baye Ndongo had 17 points and eight rebounds, helping the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets earn a 91-67 win over the visiting Charleston Southern Buccaneers in Atlanta, Ga., on Wednesday.
Naithan George also scored 17 points, adding seven assists for Georgia Tech (3-3), which snapped a two-game losing streak. Jaeden Mustaf added a career-high 16 points off the bench, while Lance Terry scored 15.
Taje’ Kelly led Charleston Southern (1-7) with 20 points. Thompson Camara chipped in 14 for the Buccaneers, who dropped their fifth straight game and are still searching for their first win over a Division I opponent.
After trailing by as many as 19 in the first half, and by 15 at halftime, Charleston Southern cut its deficit to 48-40 with an 8-1 run to start the second half.
The Yellow Jackets then answered with a 9-0 run, stamped with Luke O’Brien’s 3-pointer with 13:49 remaining. From there, the Georgia Tech lead ballooned to 69-48 on Mustaf’s jumper at the 9:05 mark.
Camara’s 3-pointer trimmed the Buccaneers’ deficit to 16 with 4:33 left, but Ndongo’s ensuing layup began a 12-4 Georgia Tech run to finish off the win.
Early in the first half, Kelly’s triple knotted the score at 10, before Ndongo’s layup finished Georgia Tech’s 6-0 run.
A pair of Ndongo mid-range jumpers then jumpstarted an 8-0 Yellow Jackets spurt, extending Georgia Tech’s lead to 24-12 with 10:50 left in the opening half.
Mustaf’s jumper gave the Yellow Jackets their largest lead to that point, a 45-26 advantage at the 1:48 mark of the opening half. Charleston Southern answered with a 6-0 run before Terry’s jumper with 16 seconds left gave Georgia Tech a 47-32 halftime lead.
Ndongo paced Georgia Tech with nine first-half points, while Kelly paced the Buccaneers with nine.
–Field Level Media