Beginning a two-game home stretch, Georgia Southern (14-6) took on the Texas State Bobcats (13-8). 

The first half began with Georgia Southern winning the tip, but the Bobcats came out fast, posting a 10-2 run before junior guard Tookie Brown ended it with two of his 8 straight team points.

Tookie Brown continued to play his game throughout the half, and after 15 minutes of play, he had 15 points. At this point, the Eagles were tied at 28.

As the half winded down, even with an electrifying block by Mike Hughes, Texas State had the lead 35-32. Georgia Southern finished the half making only 1 of their last 8 baskets.

At half, Tookie Brown led the game in scoring with 19 points with senior forward, Coye Simmons, contributing with 6 rebounds.

The second half started out equal, both teams playing really good defense while not putting many points on the board.

That was until a 7-0 run that was capped off by a Shawn O’Connell put back dunk to ignite the crowd. Just a few seconds later, O’Connell completed his unstoppable run with a block to give the Eagles the ball.

{{tncms-inline account=”George-Anne Sports” html=”<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Eagles get dunking- <a href="https://twitter.com/GSAthletics_MBB?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@GSAthletics_MBB</a> leads the bobcats 49-41 with 10 minutes left in the game <a href="https://t.co/OTE2B4sGKd">pic.twitter.com/OTE2B4sGKd</a></p>— George-Anne Sports (@GeorgeAnneSport) <a href="https://twitter.com/GeorgeAnneSport/status/956705478486216704?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 26, 2018</a></blockquote>” id=”https://twitter.com/GeorgeAnneSport/status/956705478486216704″ type=”twitter”}}

By the time the middle of the half rolled by, the Eagles had a 49-41 lead.

The Bobcats continued to chip away at the lead, despite an Ike Smith one-handed slam that almost put a Texas State defender on a poster. Despite a shooting spell on the Texas State offense, they tied the game up with 2 minutes remaining.

Over the next two minutes, both defenses proved their worth, keeping the game within one point or tied for 2 minutes. That was until Texas State guard Tre’Larenz Nottingham, with 3.7 seconds left, drove to the basket to meet a still-standing Jake Allsmiller.

As they both hit the ground, the call was ultimately ruled a blocking foul, leaving Georgia Southern fans yelling their disapproval at the refs.

The Eagles were able to get into his head, but not enough, as Nottingham hit 1 of 2 free throws. The Eagles called two timeouts before drawing up the play that they wanted.

As the game resumed play, Jake Allsmiller passed the ball into star player, Tookie Brown, who drove down the sideline, put up a shot at the buzzer, and missed the shot.

Fans started to pour out their unhappiness, both with the score of the game and the officiating. This made for Georgia Southern’s first home loss of the season.

Tookie Brown continued his scoring ways with 25 points, also adding 5 rebounds and 6 assists to his statline.

Coye Simmons provided 10 rebounds, contributing very nicely off of the bench tonight. Also, junior Montae Glenn came up just 2 rebounds shy of a double double tonight, finishing the game with 12 points.

As a team, Georgia Southern shot 43.6 percent from the field. However, their three-point shooting tonight was atrocious, making only 2 of 21 from deep.

This was certainly a heartbreaking loss for the Eagles, but they have another game to look forward to very soon. Saturday at 5 PM against Sun Belt opponent UT-Arlington. The game will be at home and will be shown on ESPN 3.