SPARTANBURG, S.C. — Chris Clemons scored 32 points and Campbell defeated USC Upstate 85-73 in Big South Conference men’s basketball Wednesday night at the G.B. Hodge Center.
Campbell (18-11, 11-4) won its third straight game and fifth in the last six outings by shooting 56 percent from the floor — including 24-of-30 (80 percent) inside the arc.
Ja’Cor Nelson added 17 points on 8-of-9 shooting from the field and four assists. Andrew Eudy chipped in 15, plus 10 rebounds, four assists and four blocks for the Camels, who improved to 5-3 on the road in league play.
The Camels host Radford (20-9, 12-3) Saturday at 2 p.m. with the Big South regular season title and right to host the conference tournament at stake. Campbell won at Radford 68-67 last month when Clemons completed a late comeback with a buzzer-beating three.
Deion Holmes led Upstate (6-24, 1-14) with 22 points and Everette Hammond contributed 20 for the Spartans, who dropped their seventh in a row.
The nation’s leading scorer (30.1), Clemons made 11-of-22 from the floor and 6-of-7 from the line, while pulling down five boards, dealing out four assists and making four steals.
The Camels led by 14 at the half before an 11-0 run brought Upstate within 45-38 after Dalvin White’s lay-in with 17:02 remaining. Holmes’ trey with 16:05 to play cut the gap to 49-43.
Nelson scored seven points in a 10-0 Camel run to push the margin back to double figures (59-43) with 14:16 remaining.
Upstate made 10-of-24 threes (.417), but the Camels outscored the Spartans 40-16 in the paint and 23-7 off turnovers.
Campbell shot 64 percent from the floor in the opening half and led 41-27 at the break. Clemons scored 15 first-half points and had seven points in an 11-0 run when the Camels built a 16-point cushion.
The Spartans went 6:23 without a field goal and shot just 32 percent (9-28) from the floor in the opening period. CU converted five Upstate miscues into an 11-2 advantage in points off turnovers and outscored the Spartans 24-4 in the paint in the half.
Notes:
· Clemons stands 6th on the NCAA Division I all-time scoring list with 3,106 points in 126 career outings. He has extended his double-figure scoring streak to 111 games, the longest among all active players and 3rd-best in D1 history.
· Campbell’s 55 victories over the past three seasons stands as the most in a three-year span in CU’s Division I era, surpassing the 51 wins the Camels compiled from 1992-94.
· CU’s 11-4 start in Big South play is the program’s best since rejoining the Big South in 2011-12.
(Campbell media services provided the basis for this report)
