— By David Walsh
HUNTINGTON, W.Va. — Troy came back from 14 points down a minute into the second half to edge Marshall, 58-57, in Sun Belt Conference basketball Saturday afternoon at the Cam Henderson Center.
Obinna Anochili-Killen hit a jumper with 19:44 left to put the Thundering Herd up, 33-19.
The Trojans started a comeback on their next trip when Tayton Conerway nailed a three-pointer. What the Herd did over the final 3:54 helped as well.
Nate Martin made 1 of 2 free throws with 3:39 to go to give Marshall a 57-54 lead. The Herd would not score again as it made one only of its last 10 shots. In the final 3:43, the Herd missed seven shots and had one shot-clock violation.
Jackson Fields got a rebound on a miss by Myles Rigsby with 26 seconds left, drew a foul and made the second of two free throws to put the Trojans ahead, 58-57. The visitors had tied the game at 57-57 with 1:33 to go on Taton Conerway’s driving layup
Marshall took a timeout, set up a potential game-winning shot, but Troy jumped the pass, messed up the play and Mikal Dawson missed a three-pointer at the buzzer.
Troy, 2-0 on this road trip after a win Thursday night at Appalachian State, is 10-4, 3-0 in the SBC. The Herd goes to 8-8, 1-2 in the SBC. Marshall is home next week for two games. James Madison visits Thursday and Georgia Southern is in Saturday.
“They defended it,” Anochili-Killen said of Troy’s defense on that last shot. “We took our foot off the pedal. We’ve got to be tough consistently. Come out the first half and play and not the second. Can’t do that. That’s the bottom line.”
First-year Herd coach Corny Jackson and Jakob Gibbs agreed with Anochili-Killen.
“The pocket pass had been there all night,” Jackson said. “Get the ball to Nate and make a play out of it. They switched. We still got a decent look. Heck of a job by them. They defended it pretty well.”
“The pocket pass had been there. They switched then and kind of threw it off,” Gibbs said.
Conerway led the Trojans with 20 points. Rigsby finished with 13.
Anochili-Killen paced Marshall with 17 points, 9 rebounds and five more blocked shots.
“We’ve just got to keep playing hard,” Anochili-Killen said. “They didn’t do anything different in the second half. We’ll be all right.”
What irked Gibbs is holding a team to 58 points and coming up short.
“Another good showing on defense,” Gibbs said. “Anytime you hold a team to 58 points you should be able to win 99 percent of the time. We’ll work to keep ticking on defense.”
Gibbs had eight points, all in the second half. He made 3-of-4 shots and 2-of-2 free throws.
“Guys keep telling me to be aggressive,” Gibbs said. “When you get to the rim, good things happen. When I get down there, I’ve got to make the right decisions. If I have a lane, take it. In the second half, I got a couple of chances and had a couple of late closeouts.”
Jackson said he expected Troy to play physical and the Trojans did.
“Those guys play hard, we play hard,” Jackson said. “They just made a few more plays down the stretch. They turned it up a little more the second half. We couldn’t get shots to fall. We get good looks, pretty clean. They made more tougher plays than we did.”
Dawson, the Herd’s leading scorer, closed with eight points. He went 1-of-8 from the field, including 0-of-5 from three. Martin converted just 3-of-9 free throws. Marshall finished with three treys to seven for the visitors. Troy made 13-of-17 free throws, all coming in the second half.
This is the third straight year the Trojans have started 3-0 in SBC play.