CHARLESTON, S.C. - After defending home court and starting the conference season 1-0, Charleston Southern headed north to face the Longwood Lancers.
The Bucs defeated Gardner-Webb for Thursday's conference opener, and directly after the ball game, hit the road for Farmville for a contest against a ball club who lost in their first conference, the Elijah Tucker led Lancers.
Reigning Big South Player of the Week, Taje' Kelly would match up against fellow Georgia native, Elijah Tucker, who is one of many talented forwards in the Big South conference this season.
Entering the ball game, the Lancers were 0-1 after dropping a game to Presbyterian College on Thursday. Lancer upperclassman, Elijah Tucker, was coming off of back-to-back 20 point performances at SMU and at Presbyterian. The Bucs have arrived to the part of the season where it almost seems to be a novelty if Taje' Kelly does not record a double-double. Kelly, coming off of five consecutive double-double performances (at Davidson, at South Carolina State, at North Alabama, at Georgia, and vs Gardner-Webb) was poised and eager to get on the court against another member of the cream of the Big South crop.
The first-half felt extremely competitive and tight, yet CSU led the entire way through. The duo of Daylen Berry and Taje' Kelly combined for 27 of the Bucs' 35 points as CSU would lead by 4 (35-31) at the halftime break.
Lancer guard Colby Garland would also get hot early as he would break into double-figures with 11 points in the first 20-minute stretch.
Many more Buccaneers and Lancers would get involved as the contest continued. Longwood would take the lead nearly two minutes into half number two, and they would hold onto it for the vast majority of the ball game.
Three Lancers would see double-figures, Kyrell Luc (19), Colby Garland (17), and Elijah Tucker (13). Those three would combine for 49 of Longwood's 83 victorious points and Charleston Southern would pick up its first conference loss of the young season, 83-78.
Taje' Kelly would lead the Bucs in the scoring column with 25, while RJ Johnson (19) and Daylen Berry (18) would not trail far behind. Team captain and recent returnee to the court, DJ Patrick would also join the double-figure scoring squad with 12 points of his own. Johnson, a former league player of the week award winner, would come closer than Kelly to a double-double tonight as Kelly's 5 total rebounds looked far less impressive than Johnson's 8 assists. The 8 dimes thrown by Johnson marks his best mark in that statistic so far this season while also tying his career-high in the category.
Another home game is on the horizon for Head Coach Saah Nimley's crew. The Bucs will host the High Point Panthers on Wednesday (Jan. 8) night at 7 PM in Buccaneer Fieldhouse.
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