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Frank Gaines scored all 14 of his points in the second half to lead Fort Wayne to a 62-60 win against South Dakota Thursday at Memorial Coliseum.
Luis Jacobo added 13 points for the Mastodons (9-11, 2-4 Summit) and gave his team a 59-58 lead with a driving layup with 34 seconds to play. Isaiah McCray made it 61-58 with two free throws with 13 seconds left. Three points was the largest lead of the game for Fort Wayne.
South Dakota guard Brandon Bos scored a layup to make it 61-60 and the Coyotes fouled Gaines with six seconds left. Gaines missed the first free throw, but made the second to make it 62-60. Juevol Myles took the inbounds pass for the Coyotes, drove up the left side of the court and saw his three-point attempt bounce off the back of the rim and away as time expired.
The miss capped a 2-of-15 night from South Dakota’s leading scorer on the season, Myles, who had nine points. USD center Trevor Gruis led all players with 15 points and seven rebounds.
South Dakota (7-12, 3-4) led by as many as nine in the first half and by four, 30-26, at the break. Gruis had nine first-half points. Gaines, the league’s third-leading scorer at 18 points per game, was scoreless in the first half on 0-of-7 shooting. He finished 4-of-16.
A Jordan Boots three-pointer gave the Coyotes their largest lead of the second half, 47-40, with 12 minutes to go. Gaines gave the Mastodons their first lead of the half with a free throw near the seven-minute mark that made it 49-48.
Bos gave the Coyotes the lead twice in the final two minutes. His second 3 of the game made it 56-55 with 1:35 to go. He countered a Joe Edwards jumper with one of his own on the Coyotes’ next possession that made it 58-57 with 52 seconds left. Bos finished with 12 points.
The loss drops South Dakota to 1-7 on the road this season, where the team will play seven of their final 10 games. The Coyotes take on Oakland in Rochester, Mich., Saturday at 6 p.m. ET.
