After battling 45 minutes in front of an electrified crowd in Stopher Gym Saturday, the Colonels basketball team fell in overtime to visiting Texas-San Antonio 83-81.
The Colonels (3-17, 1-11 SLC), whose last overtime game was in the 2001 season against Louisiana-Monroe, were out-scored 9-7 by Texas-San Antonio.
Trailing 81-80, Texas-San Antonio (6-11, 3-7 SLC) took advantage of a missed shot by Colonels senior guard Beau O’Quinn with 28 seconds left.
With a one-point lead and three seconds left in overtime, UTSA guard Kerry Willis hit the game winning three-point to end the Colonels chances of a victory.
Willis said the play needed patience from him and his teammates in order to work completely.
“At the time-out with 28 seconds left, we decided to spread the floor and head for the basket with ten seconds left. We got some penetration, but Nicholls did a good job of rotating defensively and cutting us off,” Willis said.
“We made some extra passes, and I was wide open and was able to knock it off.”
For the game, the Colonels shot 46 percent from the three-point line and 51 percent from the field. UTSA shot 52 percent from the field and 50 percent from the free throw line.
Besides Willis’ game winning three-pointer, the Colonels knew they had to defend the three-point line in order to beat UTSA.
“They shot the ball very well. You had to guard them on the perimeter, and it was hard to double the post because they are highly capable of making threes. So, we decided that they were going to have to beat us from inside the three-point line as opposed to making threes,” Ricky Blanton, head basketball coach, said.
“As it turned out, we made the right decision because all the way to the end they beat us with a perimeter jump shot. We did what we had to do, but could not come up with it in the end.”
According to UTSA coach Tim Carter, Blanton’s plan to swamp the three-point might have been the real difference in the game. Going into the contest, UTSA wanted to physically grind it out with the Colonels by using their height advantage.
For most of the game, UTSA penetrated the ball to the post, where power forward Raymond Briggs notched up 23 points. Most of Briggs’ points came from the post, where he also had six rebounds and one block.
“We have been limiting down on the jump shots, and tonight we got the basketball inside to Raymond Briggs. We thought the height situation was kind of to our advantage for the first time this season,” Carter said.
Offensively for the Colonels, junior forward Anthony Wilcher led the team with 25 points and five rebounds.
Senior forward Earnest Porter and guard Beau O’Quinn each scored 12 points and five rebounds a piece. Sophomore forwards Dominique Gleason and Eric James each contributed nine.
The Colonels out-rebounded UTSA 32-20, but turned the ball over 16 times.
Blanton said the Colonels six for 12 shooting from the free throw line were huge.
“Our ability to score and draw fouls in the post kept us in the game,” Blanton said.
By hitting a last second three-point shot at the buzzer and notching the game trying basket to send the game into overtime, Blanton said O’Quinn possibly played his best game this season.
“Beau plays with a lot of heart and passion, and you have to respect that. That is why he’s been good because he brings a competitive nature to our team, and he comes out everyday in practice and plays hard,” Blanton said.
“You got to try to keep it levelheaded because you never know which way the ball is going to bounce. It didn’t bounce our way, but it was definitely an emotional and roller coaster of a game,” O’Quinn said.
The Colonels will have to heal their wounds quickly because two of the Southland conference’s hottest teams will travel to Stopher Gym starting tonight at 7:45 p.m.
Against Lamar (8-9, 5-5 SLC), the Colonels will have to stop the Southland Conference leading scorer Damany Hendrix. Hendrix averages 17.6 points per game.
Saturday against Sam Houston (14-3, 10-0 SLC), the Colonels will take on the best team in the Southland Conference. Sam Houston is led by Don Cole, who averages 16 points per game.
“We are almost there, and we are going to pull one out. We have two more home games, and we will try to pull at least one of them out,” Gleason said.