Sam's double-double leads Southern past MVSU 55-51 (Feb 12, 2018)

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) Jared Sam scored 18 points and grabbed 15 rebounds to help Southern beat Mississippi Valley State 55-51 on Monday night.

Jamar Sandifer added 12 points, Eddie Reese had 11 points, six boards, and four assists, and Chris Thomas scored 10 for Southern (12-14, 8-5 Southwestern Athletic Conference). The Jaguars were 15 of 23 from the free-throw line compared to MVSU's eight attempts.

Southern's lead was cut to 36-34 with 10:30 left in the game but MVSU didn't score again until the 5:41 mark. The Delta Devils pulled to 51-48 after Jordan Evans's three free throws but Sam answered with a basket and split a pair of free throws on back-to-back possessions to seal it.

Dante Scott scored 24 points and grabbed seven rebounds for MVSU (2-24, 2-11). Emmanuel Ejeh added 10 rebounds.

MVSU was held to just 16 first-half points on 7-of-30 shooting (23.3 percent) with eight turnovers.