49ers Torch UAB in Second-Half Surge
By Steve Irvine
BIRMINGHAM, ALABAMA - March 13, 2026
The Charlotte men’s basketball team is putting an end to the notion that it takes 40 minutes to win a college basketball. As it turns out, perhaps 20 minutes of nearly flawless shooting is enough. At least, it has been enough for the 49ers in the American Conference Tournament at Legacy Arena.
UAB is the latest victim to Charlotte’s second half offensive onslaught. The only reason that Charlotte’s 76.9 percent shooting second half in the 83-78 quarterfinal victory over the Blazers on Friday afternoon isn’t a tournament record is that the 49ers shot a shade better in the final 20 minutes less than 24 hours prior.
“Feel like I could just rewind exactly what I said in the opening statements last night,” said Charlotte head coach Aaron Fearne, whose team shot 77.3 percent from the field in Thursday’s second round win over Tulane. “We didn't shoot the ball great first half, but hung in there. They're a difficult team to play with the changing defenses, two games in a row we've come out in the second half and just shot the lights out. That helps. That definitely helps when we can do those types of things.”
Obviously, the view from the other side was not nearly as enjoyable, even on a day that Chance Westry set a tournament record with 15 assists, Quaran McPherson made three clutch 3-pointers and Daniel Rivera had 20 points and nine rebounds.
“They were good in the second half,” said UAB head coach Andy Kennedy. “I just passed Coach Fearne in the hallway and I said, tomorrow I would just tell the refs let's skip the first half and let's just get right to the second. They shoot 77 percent; they make 14 threes. When you give up 77 percent on defense and your opponent makes 14 threes, you're typically not going to like the outcome.”
Charlotte was 10-for-14 from 3-point range after halftime and connected on 14 consecutive shots from the field at one point in the second half. Much of the damage was done by Dazayne Mingo, who had 19 of his career-high 35 points after halftime. He was 7-for-7 from the field in the second half with five of those coming from outside the 3-point arc.
“We were allowing Mingo to continue to carry them,” Kennedy said.
Mingo also had five assists, which showed he had some help. Ben Bradford and Damani Harrison combined for 23 second half points with Harrison hitting three 3-pointers.
“Everything was going wrong,” Kennedy said. “We're a team that switches our defenses and I'm sitting here looking because we have a breakdown of our defenses. When we were in our 1-3-1, they were 3-for-3. When we were in our 2-3 zone they were 12-for-21. When we were in our 3-2 zone they were 4-for-4. When we were in our man-to-man they were 14-for-22. So everything was going wrong. I kept challenging our group in timeouts because really, they were staying in the game because they were offensive rebounding the ball and then Mingo was just carrying them. We were trying to be more aware, make somebody else make a shot, and then when we finally got the ball out of his hands, his teammates really stepped up and made big plays.”
Charlotte led by as many as nine points in the second half but somehow UAB found a way to crawl back in the game. Mingo’s 3-pointer gave Charlotte a 76-67 lead with 4:38 left. Westry drove to the basket for a layup 15 seconds later and the Blazers got the ball back when Rivera blocked a shot. McPherson hit a free throw and Dayjaun Anderson made a short jumper to cut Charlotte’s lead to 76-72. McPherson stole the inbound pass after Anderson’s basket and nailed a 3-pointer from the top of the key with 2:07 left in the game.
Charlotte called a timeout to regroup but the 49ers almost lost the ball on the ensuing possession. However, instead of a turnover, the ball caromed to Harrison on the left wing. He quickly shot a 3-pointer that went in the basket.
UAB cut the lead to one point on a free throw by Westry and a layup by Rivera with 59 seconds left. Mingo drove to the basket for a layup with 38 seconds remaining to build the lead back to three points. UAB called a timeout to set a play, presumably a 3-pointer because the Blazers had just three fouls at the time and it would have been difficult to send Charlotte to the line before time ran out. Instead, they ran the clock down before Westry drove to the basket and missed a contested layup.
“We had kind of a disjointed team in, and (Anderson), despite him going 0 for 6, I still thought he should be in some screening action,” Kennedy said. “Maybe he gets lost and we get a shot. We were trying to run a little bit of a floppy action, screen double screen, and he went the wrong way. As a result, Chance did what he had to do and he tried to get downhill and missed the layup.”
Fittingly, a frustrating season that included trouble winning at home came with a loss in Birmingham. Technically, the game ended a 10-game winning streak in games played away from Bartow Arena but the Blazers were still playing in their hometown with hopes of advancing to play top seed South Florida on Saturday.
“Yeah, it's disappointing, and this one is here in Legacy with homecourt advantage, so to speak, and for us not to be able to give ourselves a chance to advance is disappointing,” Kennedy said. “I'm disappointed. I apologized to the commissioner, and I thought we had good fan support today. It's a noon game on Friday. Not the easiest thing to do when you're working. I felt like we could have built some momentum if we could have advanced.”