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MOBILE, Ala. – After seeing their 15-point lead cut to two with 2:23 left in the game, the University of South Alabama men's basketball team responded with eight unanswered points to snap their six-game losing streak and defeat Louisiana-Lafayette 81-73 Thursday night at the Mitchell Center.

The Jaguars earn their first Sun Belt victory of the season to improve to 7-11 overall and 1-4 in league play. The Ragin' Cajuns fall to 11-6 and 2-2.

"I'm really, really excited about our win here tonight," USA head coach Matthew Graves said. "It just shows that if you have a team that stays together and works really hard, there's complete buy in. Guys are starting to understand what we want to do offensively and defensively. The thing I was most pleased about tonight was that we held them to below 40 percent field goal percentage defense."

South Alabama shot a season-best 59.2 percent from the floor and survived 26 turnovers, the most by the program since Nov. 18, 2001.

"We left a lot of possessions out there on the court tonight and notice I didn't say points because I thought offensively turning the ball over 26 times, we're not going to add that to the game plan as far as the way to win," Graves noted. "You're fortunate to win a game when you turn it over that many times, but defensively we really hung tough and did a great job making it tough on them to get easy looks."

USA senior Augustine Rubit (Houston, Texas) led all scorers with 21 points, shooting 7 of 10 from the floor and 7 of 7 from the free-throw line.

He also tied his career high with five blocks, part of 12 as a team which is tied for third in school history and a new Mitchell Center record.

Rubit's effort also helped the Jags record 40 points in the paint, their most over a Division I opponent this season. The team went 21-for-26 on two-point field goals.

"The two big emphasis coming into this week was we wanted to attack them inside out and we wanted to get the ball in the paint," Graves stated. "We talked about that in a lot of different games this year and we haven't followed through with it and I think we really took it to the extreme in practice this week. We were on guys to get the ball in the paint, (we told them) it's got to touch the paint, you've got to drive it to the paint and Augustine needs another touch. We were constantly harping on that and it really shows."

The Jaguars scored the final six points of the first half and five of the first six in the second half to open up a 13-point lead. The Cajuns used a 13-5 run midway through the second half to cut a 15-point lead down to seven, then later outscored the Jags 11-3 over a 1:25 stretch to cut the margin down to 69-67 with 2:23 left.

"We didn't quit," Louisiana-Lafayette head coach Bob Marlin said. "We were down double figures with 10 minutes to go, and we fought back and made a good comeback that just fell a little bit short. Our guys played hard; I thought we really played hard tonight. Our press was good and we turned it up and forced South into 26 turnovers. We didn't quit, but that's not a lot of consolation at this stage."

ULL's run would end there as South Alabama reeled off eight unanswered points over 43 seconds for a 77-67 lead. Freshman Aakim Saintil (Roselle, N.J.) got a steal and took it the rest of the way to finish off the spurt.

"We really showed some resolve tonight," Graves said. "Ken (Williams) stepped up and made a big play. He drove the ball to the basket and got a foul. I think a couple of games ago he might have settled for a 3-point shot in that case instead of attacking the rim. The other thing I thought we did a really good job of was getting the ball to Augustine. Even though he missed two shots in a row down the stretch, we continued to give him a second look. In the past, we would give him one look then get it back and shoot a '3' or turn it over. We threw the ball back to him and made things happen."

Four of the five USA starters reached double-digit points. Freshman Ken Williams (Manvel, Texas) posted 18 on three 3-pointers, and Saintil set a new career high with 15, also on a personal-best three triples. Senior Antoine Allen (Baltimore, Md.) tallied 12 points.

Elfrid Payton paced the Cajuns with 18 points and a game-high six assists. Shawn Long recorded his eighth double-double of the year with 15 points and 10 rebounds and Kevin Brown came off the bench to add 14 points on 4 of 5 shooting from long range.

South Alabama takes a day off before hosting Louisiana-Monroe Saturday at 7:30 p.m. in a game televised by the Sun Belt Network (CSS/Cox Sports).

NOTES: The Jaguars' losing streak was the longest by the program since 2004-05… USA has won four straight vs. ULL, the longest streak in the series' history… Rubit is South Alabama's all-time leader in free throw attempts (682) and he moved into fourth in career blocks (112)… Rubit started his 100th career game… The Jags grabbed a season-low five offensive rebounds but converted them into eight points… Junior Mychal Ammons (Vicksburg, Miss.) grabbed eight rebounds and set a new career high with five assists… The team dished out 17 assists overall, tying its season high previously set in a triple-overtime loss at Rice on Dec. 7… ULL's bench put up 26 points to USA's season-low six… South Alabama's second-half shooting percentage of .583 is a new season best… Despite the Jags' 26 miscues, the Cajuns scored just 16 points off them… Louisiana-Lafayette's 73 points are its fewest in a Sun Belt game this season and tied for its second-fewest overall since Nov. 15... The Jaguars are 7-2 when scoring 70 or more this season.

For more information about South Alabama athletics, check back with www.usajaguars.com, and follow the Jaguars at www.twitter.com/USAJaguarSports. Season tickets for all Jaguar athletic events can be purchased by calling (251) 461-1USA (1872).

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