Zione White tied his career-high with 26 points as High Point punched its ticket for the championship game of the 2004 Advance Auto Parts Big South Men's Basketball Tournament with a 63-49 semifinal victory over defending-champion UNC Asheville Thursday night at the Millis Center.
The second-seeded Panthers (19-10) advance to their second title game in only their third Big South Tournament appearance, and will meet top-seeded Liberty (an 88-73 winner over Coastal Carolina in the night's first semifinal) in Saturday's championship at 2:00 pm EST in the Vines Center in Lynchburg, Va.
The game will be broadcast live nationwide on ESPN2. Click here for information on joining High Point fans on a charter bus to Lynchburg. HPU students can click here for ticket and travel information.
High Point trailed the Bulldogs (9-20) by a 30-28 count at halftime, but used three-consecutive White three pointers as part of an 11-0 run to take control and a 43-34 advantage early in the second half. The Panthers wouldn't trail again, and held UNCA without a field goal for the final 8:28 of the game to claim their fifth-straight victory overall.
UNC Asheville was paced by Chad Mohn's team-high 13 points and eight rebounds, while Steven Rush (12 points off the bench) and K.J. Garland (10 points) also scored in double-figures.
HPU, which shot 48 percent for the game, got 11 points, five assists and four rebounds from Jorsua Chambers and 10 points and a career-high-tying 14 rebounds from Danny Gathings (his Big South-leading 12th double-double of the year).
The nip-and-tuck first half featured 16 lead changes and six ties, and neither team led by more than three points. Oliver Holmes put the Bulldogs on top with 58 seconds left in the half after his layup made it 30-28, which was the score at intermission.
Gathings tied the score at 34-34 three minutes into the second half before White caught fire and hit three of his four three-pointers on back-to-back-to-back possessions to help HPU build its biggest lead of the game at 43-34. After Rush answered back with a trey for UNCA, a Jerry Echenique layup and a Landon Quick jumper pushed High Point's lead to double-digits at 47-37 with 12:19 to play.
But Asheville scored the next eight points to claw within 47-45 at the 9:40 mark, and after a Gathings jumper, Rush drained another three to make it a one-point affair at 49-48.with 8:28 to play. It would be the Bulldogs' final field-goal of the game. High Point scored 14 of the game's final 15 points en route to the 63-49 win.
