BOSTON (AP) - Boston College guard Ky Bowman was bent over after being fouled and walked slowly over to the bench looking exhausted for a TV timeout.
His teammate, Jerome Robinson, encouraged him to hang in for the final few minutes.
“Yeah. I could see him a little tired and banged up,” Robinson said after the Eagles held off Florida State 81-75 on Monday night.
“I just told him to stay with it. ’Stay with me, six minutes left and we can get this win at home,’” Robinson said.
Bowman and Robinson, BC’s talented backcourt, then closed out the victory.
Facing a full-court press most of the night, Bowman scored 19 points and grabbed 13 rebounds and Jerome Robinson also had 19 points as the Eagles continue their climb in the Atlantic Coast Conference after going winless two seasons ago.
“They play a lot of minutes and it was very impressive to see what they have to do, especially with our pressure,” Seminoles forward Terance Mann said. “They have a very good one-two punch, one of the best backcourts in the country.”
Nik Popovic and Jordan Chatman each added 14 points and Steffon Mitchell had 13 with nine boards for the Eagles (13-6, 3-3 ACC).
Mann scored 21 points, CJ Walker 19 and Braian Angola 17 for Florida State (13-5, 2-4). The Seminoles lost for the third time in four games. They had won their last six meetings against BC.
The Eagles led by 16 at halftime and pushed it to 21 early in the second half.
Switching to zone midway into the opening half, the Eagles’ defense flustered the Seminoles, causing rushed shots from the outside and many contested misses in the lane.
“We played a lot of zone just to keep them out of the lane and we did a really good job for most of the game realizing who was catching the ball - was it a driver or a shooter,” BC coach Jim Christian said.
Chatman nailed consecutive 3s just over a minute apart, capping an Eagles’ 12-0 run late in the half that carried them to a 41-25 edge at intermission.
BC then scored the first five points of the second half - with Bowman hitting a 3 from the left wing - and opened its largest lead of the game.
The Eagles maintained a double-digit lead until the final five minutes when it was sliced to seven. The Seminoles had it down to five in the closing minute, but Robinson and Bowman each hit free throws to seal it.
BIG PICTURE
Florida State: The Seminoles fell out of the Top 25 this week after being in there the previous five, but the bigger problem may be the lack of confidence they could be facing after another loss. Last week, they had their 28-game home winning streak snapped by Louisville on Wednesday before edging Syracuse in double-overtime Saturday.
“We’ve just got to get back to Tallahassee (Florida) and take a couple of days off,” coach Leonard Hamilton said. “We’ve played four games in eight days. They seemed to have a little bit more energy than we did tonight.”
Boston College: The Eagles’ growth continues in the ACC. They have surpassed the total number of league wins they had combined the previous two seasons.
LONG-RANGE MATCHUP
The game featured two of the ACC’s top three teams in shots made from 3-point range. Florida State (9.3) came in leading the conference and BC (8.6) was third.
The Eagles won on this night, though, going 9 for 23; while the Seminoles were 5 of 26 after missing eight of nine in the first half.
LINEUP
Florida State guard PJ Savoy missed the game with a knee injury, but leading scorer Mann returned after being out the previous one with a concussion.
“We did not know if he would be available,” Hamilton said of Mann. “When I left Tallahassee, I did not think he was going to be able to play. He was cleared last night to play today.”
ROUGH START
The Seminoles shot just 25.6 percent (10 of 39) in the opening 20 minutes. They finished 33.8 percent for the game (27 of 80).
UP NEXT
Florida State: At Virginia Tech on Saturday.
Boston College: Opens a two-game road trip Sunday at Louisville.
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