BATON ROUGE, La. -- Lemmie Howard scored seven of his 12 points in the final four minutes and Maurice Rivers made 4 of 4 free throws in the closing seconds to help Jackson State beat Southern 65-61 on Monday night.

Rivers finished with 14 points and three blocks, and Julian Daughtry added 13 points for Jackson State (7-10, 4-0 Southwestern Athletic Conference). Rivers made just 3 of 11 from the field, but hit 7 of 8 free throws.

Emanual Shepherd hit a jumper to give Southern (5-12, 1-3) a 13-point lead about 3 1/2 minutes into the second half. The Tigers answered with a 14-3 run over the next seven minutes to trim their deficit to 46-44 before Jesse Love and Jordan Berry each hit a 3 to make it 54-all with four minutes left. Howard made a 3-pointer to break the tie and give JSU its first lead and then, after Sidney Umude's putback for the Jaguars, converted a 3-point play to extend it to 60-56.

Jared Sam made a jumper to pull Southern within one point with 16 seconds left, but Rivers's free throws sealed it.

Sam hit all of his season-high 14 free-throw attempts and finished with 22 points and a career-high tying 13 rebounds for the Jaguars.

Jackson State shot just 37.7 percent from the field, but hit 10 of 22 3-pointers and committed just six turnovers.

Jackson State is 4-0 in conference play for the first time since the 2010-11 season.