Jacksonville State basketball banked a buzzer beater to prevail against UTEP 64-61. But Mostapha El Moutauakkil hitting the game winning three to keep their slim March Madness hopes alive wasn't the talk of postgame Saturday. A fiasco with fans exploded afterwards inside Don Haskins Center in El Paso, Tex.
A fan interrupted the postgame handshake between the team. He grabbed a bench chair and looked ready to swing at someone with it. The fan berated the officials with the chair in hand before members of both teams attempted to keep him at bay.
After the conclusion of UTEP vs Jacksonville State the handshake line was interupted as a Fan picked up a Chair and began to berrate the refs and Jacksonville State's staff pic.twitter.com/kq70Fga1mn
— NCAA Buzzer Beaters & Game Winners (@NCAABuzzerBters) March 7, 2026
But both teams managed to diffuse the heated situation. And for the Gamecocks, they installed momentum ahead of the Conference USA Tournament.
Can Jacksonville State make a run, or UTEP?
The Gamecocks head to Propst Arena in Huntsville, Ala., with a 15-16 record.
Liberty sits in a stronger position, though. The Flames are the leader at 25-6 overall with a 17-3 mark in CUSA play. Liberty is projected to face Gonzaga as the 13th seed and lone CUSA representative. The Gamecocks, meanwhile, are sitting at No. 7 in the standings with their 10-10 mark in conference play.
The Gamecocks haven't made it to the Big Dance since the 2021-22 season during a time they played in the Atlantic Sun Conference. They also landed in the NCAA Tournament in 2016-17 while as a member of the Ohio Valley Conference. They'll need to win out in the tournament to make it in as CUSA can only send one team.
JSU continues to be led by longtime head coach Ray Harper, who's the fifth coach in school history. Harper owns 184 career wins on the campus in making him the program's winningest coach. He's never lost more than 19 games in each season with JSU.
UTEP, meanwhile, is second-to-last in the standings with a 7-13 record in CUSA and 11-20 mark. But the Miners will soon join the Mountain West Conference amid the latest realignment cycle.
