WICHITA, Kan — Dezayne Mingo nearly rewrote his career record book on Wednesday, but it fell just short of leading Charlotte to a win.

The 49ers made a late charge, but it wasn’t enough to overcome a six-plus-minute cold spell that allowed Wichita State to pull ahead for good in a 74–64 loss, snapping Charlotte’s four-game road winning streak against American Conference opponents and a four-game spree overall.

“That’s a tough environment against an even tougher team,” head coach Aaron Fearne said. “You’re going to face those in this conference, and it’s how you respond that determines wins and losses.

“Tonight, we didn’t have a good enough response to pull through.”

Mingo put the opening touches on his highlight reel to pull Charlotte close at the end of the first half.

His 3-pointer with seven seconds left in the first half capped an 8–2 run that pulled the visitors within one at 35–34, just part of his team-high 10 points in the opening 20 minutes and team-high 24 points overall — two shy of tying his career high set when the two teams met last month.

The back-and-forth tilt continued into the second half before a 6:13 stretch from 12:39 to 6:23 saw Charlotte go without a field goal after Mingo’s pull-up jumper. It wasn’t until the guard floated a layup over the outstretched arms of Wichita State defenders that the run ended, cutting the deficit to 62–47.

Raúl Villar’s and-one through contact minutes later cut the Shockers’ lead further to 65–58. Kenyon Giles, as he had several times en route to a game-high 23 points, hit a contested jumper falling backward at the shot-clock buzzer with 2:36 left to tilt the momentum right back to the hosts.

Arden Conyers’ free throws in the final minute cut it to seven once again, but Wichita State’s defense held strong to keep the 49ers at bay the rest of the way.

“I loved our fight to the end,” Fearne said. “It’s about putting that fight together for a full 40 minutes, and we didn’t quite do that tonight.”

Golden Outputs

Mingo’s 24 points marked his third game of at least 20 points this season and his 17th game in double figures. It came on a 9-for-15 mark from the field, his third most efficient game of the year.

Major Freeman added 11 points, and Conyers scored 10 to round out Charlotte’s double-digit scorers. It marked Freeman’s first game with at least 11 points since Nov. 27, 2025, against Illinois State.

Up Next

Charlotte returns home for a brief stay before heading back out to face Memphis at the FedExForum on Sunday at 2 p.m. The 49ers are looking to end a four-game losing streak against Memphis and capture their first win over the Tigers since Feb. 23, 2005.