With just over 10 seconds left, Neftali Alvarez stole the ball and dished it to DeAndre Pinckney, who promptly slammed-dunked it to send the sold-out crowd at Reed Green Coliseum into a frenzy.
It was a complete illustration of Southern Miss' 82-71 victory over Louisiana, but it was also a moment that punctuated the unlikely turnaround season as the Golden Eagles took sole possession of first place in the Sun Belt standings.
"We let them know that we ain't playing," said Pinckney, who scored a team-leading 22 points.
"We had a full crowd today, and that was the exclamation point," Alvarez added. "The crowd deserved it."
For Southern Miss, it was a moment, a game and a season that was never supposed to happen. Depending on which poll was looked at, the Golden Eagles were picked to finish 13th or 14th in the conference. Regardless, Southern Miss was never supposed to sit at the top of the Sun Belt standings, and now the Golden Eagles hold an overall record off 22-4 overall and 11-2 in conference play.
"To me, the (poll) is what it is and cannot be taken too seriously," Southern Miss coach Jay Ladner said. "In our case, it worked…We jumped on that immediately. We want to stay humble every day.
"It's an incredible euphoria right now, and we don't want it to end."
Pinckney, who has stayed with the program for three years, found himself battling his emotions in the pregame as he saw the crowd begin to pour in.
"I've seen it with nobody in there," Pinckney said. "I was getting emotional because I really saw it go from nobody in here to a sellout crowd.
"Nobody expected us to do what we are doing. We have got guys who believe and trust the process too. We all have the same mission."
The catalyst to the night was Alvarez, who missed the game against UL earlier in the season due to a foot injury, as he scored a season-high of 17 points and added four rebounds, four assists and two steals.
"I was back home when they played Louisiana; I was like, damn, I wanted to be there, and my team lost," Alvarez said. "I wanted to support the team.
"I knew the crowd was going to be full today. I knew that today was our day. We want to be in first place, and we did what we did."
Behind Alvarez were three other Golden Eagles that scored in double digits as well as the first sellout crowd since 2008 and the fifth largest in program history that numbered at 8,097.
The two teams had little separation through the first 15 minutes of the first half, but leading scorer Austin Crowley picked up two fouls, which led to him playing just seven minutes in the first half. As a result, the Cajuns went on a 10-0 run to take a 34-24 lead. The Golden Eagles closed the gap with a 9-0 run, but UL made a bucket as time expired and allowed the Ragin Cajuns to hold a 38-33 lead at the half.
"We got into serious foul trouble," Ladner said. "We made it to halftime and made a nice little run there to get back together.
"We were only down four and able to save Austin into the second half. I thought that was really important for us."
In the second half, Felipe Haase heated up as he scored all 17 of his points in the second half to kickstart an 11-1 run that led to USM taking a 55-49 lead that the Golden Eagles never relinquished. Crowley also scored eight of his 13 points in the second half as well.
"Our fan base has been so hungry," Ladner said. "We have struggled the last couple of years, and to go where we were from the start of the season, to go from probably just a few hundred people in the stands to selling out. There's great spirit in that. Our players are feeding off that. They are impacting many. Reed Green is a special place, and it was special again tonight.
"I cannot overstate the importance of a (sellout)," Ladner said. "My boss can tell you what it means to the box office and bottom line because it helps our financial situation. But it means way more than that. It means so much."
Southern Miss hosts Louisiana-Monroe on Saturday at 2:30 p.m.
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