ABILENE – The ACU Wildcats have lost more than 1,000 games in 90 seasons of intercollegiate men's basketball. It's unlikely they've ever lost one in the manner in which they lost Tuesday night.
Michael Loyd hit a technical free throw with 0.17 seconds left in regulation to give Midwestern State a 79-78 win over the Wildcats in a Lone Star Conference game at Moody Coliseum.
The free throw came after
Antonio Bell had capped an ACU comeback from a 20-point deficit with a 3-pointer to tie the game at 78-78. But ACU freshman
Da-Juan Cooper was called for a technical foul for taunting with less than one second left in regulation to give the nation's 11th-ranked team a chance to win in regulation and avoid the upset.
Loyd made the first free throw, but missed the second for the Mustang victory.
The loss drops the Wildcats to 10-11 overall and 2-9 in the LSC, while the Mustangs improve to 17-2 and 10-2. ACU – which is now tied for last in the 10-team LSC – will be back in action Saturday at 4 p.m. when it takes on Cameron in Lawton, Okla.
The Wildcats played well early on, jumping out to a 24-18 lead in the first 10 minutes of the game. But the Mustangs outscored the Wildcats 28-6 to end the first half with a 46-30 lead.
The Mustangs quickly pushed the lead to 20 points (50-30) before the Wildcats was able to cut the lead back to 10 points at 52-42. The MSU lead stayed somewhere between nine and 16 points the rest of the way before ACU finally got it below double-digits at 75-67 with 2:50 to play on a dunk by Cooper.
MSU got the lead back to 10 points with 2:17 to play, but the Wildcats got it back to 77-69 on a dunk by
Zach Williams with 1:56 left. Bell then hit a jumper after a JaMichael Rivers turnover to make it 77-71 with 1:18 left in the game.
After a free throw by MSU with 57 seconds left,
Kendall Durant hit a pair of free throws after an Anthony Harris technical foul to cut it to 78-73. Bell then hit a pair of free throws with 48 seconds left to cut it to 78-75.
After each team missed a shot, Rivers missed a pair of free throws with 12 seconds left and Cooper grabbed the defensive rebound. He got the ball to Durant, who got the ball up the floor to Bell, who tried to get the ball to
Armani Williams for a game-tying 3-pointer.
With no one open, he launched an off-balance 3-pointer over Keonte Logan that hit nothing but the bottom of the net to tie the game. But after reviewing the tape, the officials concluded that Bell and Cooper had both gone to the MSU bench and taunted the Mustangs before the clock had expired. Cooper was whistled for the technical, Loyd hit the free throw and the Wildcats walked out of the gym with a kick-in-the-gut loss.
Durant finished with a game-high 21 points, while Bell had 15 and
Zach Williams 14.
