By MONTE DUTTON

In Music City, Furman picked up a spine-tingling men’s basketball victory on Friday night.
Home fires were burning – burning down, figuratively, in Saturday’s football loss to Wofford – and the women’s basketball team endured a hopeless task in Athens, Ga., but all else was well.
Men’s basketball shoots for another victory at Bon Secours Wellness Arena on Monday night, coming off an exhilarating victory on Friday night.
The Paladins’ lone All-SoCon selection – in the preseason, anyway — PJay Smith Jr., drained a go-ahead three-pointer with 2.3 seconds left to lift Furman to a 76-74 victory over Belmont at Curb Event Center in Nashville, Tenn.

Trailing 74-71 with under 30 seconds to play, Smith penetrated the left side of the lane and scooped a shot off the glass to cut the deficit to one point. The Paladins fouled Belmont’s Isaiah Walker with 15 seconds to go, and the guard missed the front end of a one-and-one.
After Furman advanced the ball into the frontcourt and drew a foul with under seven seconds to play, the Paladins inbounded the ball to Nick Anderson, who made a quick pass to Smith. The senior used a screen from Tom House at the top of the key and buried the winning shot to send the Paladins to their third consecutive win over the Bruins.
Smith, who grew up less than 15 miles from the Belmont campus in LaVergne, Tenn., connected on 5/8 three-point attempts to pace the Paladins with 21 points. Anderson hit five first-half threes to score 17 points, and forward Garrett Hien added 15 points, six rebounds and six assists. Sophomore Cooper Bowser pulled down a game-high 10 rebounds and swatted four Belmont shots.

Furman (2-0) led 42-34 at the half and maintained a 52-43 advantage with 14:30 left Belmont (1-1) went on a 15-3 run to grab a 58-55 lead with 9:35 to go. Belmont extended its lead to 69-63 with less than five minutes to play before Eddrin Bronson dunked, Davis Molnar finished a three-point play at the foul line and House knocked down a triple from the left wing to give Furman a 71-69 advantage.
The Bruins’ Brody Peebles, who poured in a game-high 26 points, netted the next five to put Belmont (1-1) on top before Smith scored the final five points to propel Furman to its first victory over the Bruins in Nashville.

The Paladins outrebounded the Bruins 34-27 and shot .475 from the floor, including a 16/35 performance from behind the arc. Belmont held a commanding 54-18 scoring edge in the paint, but Furman outscored the home team by 33 points from three-point range and got 23 points from its bench.
Furman returns home to Bon Secours Wellness Arena to host the Jacksonville Dolphins for a 7 p.m. tip-off on Monday night.
A victory would see the Paladins start 3-0 for the first time since 2020-21.

Take a look at the stats here.

Jacksonville (1-1) comes to Greenville after dropping an 81-60 decision versus No. 21 Florida on Thursday night. The Dolphins opened the season with a 78-65 win over Trinity Baptist.
Monday’s game marks the 16th all-time meeting between the schools with Jacksonville holding an 8-7 series lead. The Dolphins downed the Paladins 65-53 in the last meeting in Jacksonville, Fla., during the 2012-13 season. Furman has won four of the seven encounters in Greenville.
The Southern Conference and Atlantic Sun Conference created a two-year partnership this summer that will see each league school play two games against opponents from the other conference. In addition to Monday’s game, Furman is scheduled to travel to Fort Myers, Fla., next month to take on Florida Gulf Coast. The partnership was created to help each league’s schools play meaningful games against a similar conference within its regional footprint.
The game will be streamed live on ESPN+ and can be heard on The Fan Upstate at 97.7 FM and 1330 AM in Greenville, 97.1 FM and 1490 AM in Spartanburg, and via the Audacy app.
Following Monday’s tilt versus Jacksonville, Furman hosts American Athletic Conference member Tulane on Friday night at Bon Secours Wellness Arena.

De’Mauri Flournoy scored 15 of her team leading 18 points in the second half, and Georgia used a strong third quarter to pull away for a 74-46 win over Furman in women’s basketball play Sunday afternoon at Stegeman Coliseum in Athens.
The win keeps Georgia (3-0) perfect on the young season while Furman (2-1) suffered its first loss.
The Bulldogs led Furman 26-23 with under a minute to go in the first half when Asia Avinger was fouled on a three-point attempt from the top of the circle. She converted all three freebies, and the Summer Davis finished off the first half by converting a steal into a layup to send the Bulldogs into halftime with a 31-23 edge.

Flournoy opened the second half with a driving layup and finished off a 9-0 third quarter run — and 14-point overall spurt — with a jump shot to stretch Georgia’s advantage to 40-23 midway through the third period.
The Bulldogs went on to outscore the Paladins 19-8 in the third quarter for a 50-31 lead.
Avinger followed Fluornoy in the scoring column with 17 points. Trinity Turner finished with 11 points, and Amiya Evans and Summer Davis rounded out the five double-figure scoring performances by the Bulldogs with 10 points apiece.

Furman’s Kate Johnson tied Flournoy for game high scoring honors with 18, including 14 in the over the game’s first 20 mintues. The Paladin senior forward made 7/11 shots and added five rebounds in 24 minutes of action, but she and her teammates had to deal with foul trouble for most of the contest.
The Paladins turned the ball over 21 times, which Georgia converted into 21 points, and the Paladins connected on just 2/20 triples.
The Bulldogs shot .394 percent from the field (26/66) and posted a 44-37 edge in rebounding, with Evans’ nine leading the way.
Freshman Clare Coyle paced Furman for a third consecutive game with seven rebounds.
Furman returns to action on Thursday when it hits the road for a 6 p.m. contest against East Carolina.

Take a look at the stats here.

The Paladins are a win away from the SoCon men’s soccer title after a tense victory over top-seeded UNC Greensboro in Sunday’s semifinal, hosted by the Spartans.
Sophomore Aaron Salinas made a pair of saves in a penalty-kick shootout and freshman Ryan Wagner converted the winning penalty in the seventh round as Furman advanced, 6-5, following a 1-1 draw.
The Paladins (8-3-5) face East Tennessee State in the championship match next Sunday, Nov. 17, at 2 p.m. in Johnson City, Tenn., at Summers-Taylor Stadium.
After hitting the bar on a header in the 16th minute, the Spartans took the early lead at the 25:09 mark. UNCG looped a ball inside the six-yard box that was headed out by the Paladin defense. Sami Lachekar ran to the loose ball and laced a right-footed volley into the right-hand side of the net to give the Spartans the first-half lead.

UNCG went down to 10 men at the 81:58 mark when Issah Haruna was shown the red card for kicking a Paladin player in the head as Furman was rushing to take a free kick. The Paladins dominated possession from that point and found the equalizer with nine seconds left in regulation. Furman lofted a cross into the UNCG box, and a scramble for the ball ensued before freshman Luke Hutzell got on the end of a shot from the middle of the box that found the back of the net at the 89:51 mark.
The Paladins accounted for all five shots over two overtime periods but were only able to put one on goal, saved by UNCG’s Seth Wilson.

After both teams converted their first spot kick, Salinas stopped Steven Hernandez’s shot and Furman’s Christian Kraus hit the cross bar. The next four penalty takers converted for both teams to send the shootout to a seventh round. Salinas stopped Maxwel De-Bodene’s shot, and Wagner fired his effort past Wilson to give the Paladins the 6-5 edge in the shootout.

Furman outshot the Spartans 20-9, including a 5-3 advantage in shots on goal. The Paladins managed a 13-0 margin in shots after the 82nd minute red card was issued to Haruna.
Salinas posted two saves in regulation before his two stops in the shootout. Wilson totaled four saves for the Spartans.

Freshman Wilfer Bustamante and junior Lloyd Wamu Snell netted first-half goals to propel No. 4 seed Furman past No. 5 seed Mercer, 2-0, in the opening round of the tournament on Friday night.
Bustamante, a Greenville native and product of J.L. Mann High School, gave the Paladins a 1-0 lead in the 20th minute. Wamu Snell sent a long cross from near the left corner flag to the far side of the box. Christian Kraus headed the cross into the path of Bustamante who headed the ball past Mercer goalkeeper Trevor McMullen from close range.
Furman doubled its lead in the 38th minute as Luke Hutzell played a long, curling cross in front of Wamu Snell racing down the left channel. The forward took a couple of touches before slotting a shot into the right-hand corner for his fifth goal of the season.

“I’m really proud of the kids for scoring a couple of early goals and getting the shutout,” stated Paladin head coach Doug Allison. “I’m happy for Wilfer and Wamu to get those goals because they’ve been working hard on that all week.”
Sophomore Salinas, who was named the SoCon Goalkeeper of the Year, earned the clean sheet for the Paladins.
The victory helped Furman avenge last year’s 2-0 defeat to Mercer (6-5-7) in the SoCon finals. Friday’s game was a rematch of last weekend’s regular-season finale at Stone Stadium in which the Paladins and Bears fought to a 1-1 draw.

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