LAS VEGAS – ACU put together one of its best halves of basketball of the season Monday afternoon as the Wildcats rallied from a seven-point halftime deficit to pull out a 65-59 win over South Carolina State in the Continental Las Vegas Classic at the Orleans Arena.
The win snaps a two-game losing streak for the Wildcats, who improve to 5-6 on the season after their second win over an NCAA Division I opponent this season. The Bulldogs, meanwhile, fall to 4-9 with the loss. The Wildcats will be back in action Tuesday at 5 p.m. (Abilene time) against Arkansas-Pine Bluff, which knocked off Southern Utah earlier Monday.
The Wildcats trailed 30-23 at halftime after another tough shooting performance (9 for 23), but turned the game around in the second half. The turnaround happened quickly as ACU outscored the Bulldogs 9-0 in the first 2:58 of the half to take a 32-30 lead.
Harrison Hawkins hit back-to-back jumpers to start the half, followed by a 3-pointer from
Parker Wentz that tied the game at 30-30 with 17:50 left in the game.
Austin Cooke gave the Wildcats their first lead since 4-3 early in the game with a jumper, putting the Wildcats up 32-30 with 17:02 to play.
The Wildcats fell behind 35-32 before Hawkins hit a 3-pointer and
LaDarrien Williams followed with another to get their team started on a 15-2 run that put the Wildcats in front for good. Cooke hit a 3-pointer in the run to make it 41-37, and then had a tip-in off a Williams miss to make it 43-37 with 13:42 to play. Williams capped the game-turning run with a layup to give the Wildcats an insurmountable 45-37 led with 11:55 to play.
ACU would never trail again, but things did get a little dicey late in the game. After Cooke missed a layup, Tashombe Riley grabbed the rebound and hit Edward Stephens with an outlet pass, and he converted the fast-break layup to cut the Wildcats' lead to just 52-51 with 3:36 to play.
But
Parker Wentz answered with one of the biggest 3-pointers of his career when he buried a 3-pointer from the right wing to give the Wildcats a 55-51 lead with 3:21 to play. Williams hit a jumper with 2:17 to play to make it 57-51, and then Hawkins hit a pair of free throws with 1:17 to play to make it 59-53.
South Carolina State was able to cut the lead to 60-57 with 39 seconds to play, and after Hawkins missed a jumper and the Bulldogs got the rebound, they had a chance to tie the game with less than 20 seconds to play. But a 3-pointer from Stephens was short and Williams was fouled when he grabbed the rebound. He calmly knocked down both free throws to make it 62-57 with nine seconds to play.
The Bulldogs got a layup from Stephens to make it a 62-59 game with three seconds left, but Darryl Palmer was whistled for a technical foul when he reached across the end line and slapped the ball out of Williams' hands. Wentz hit both technical free throws and then hit another when he was fouled with two seconds left to make the final 65-59.
The win for the Wildcats is their first over an NCAA Division I opponent away from Moody Coliseum since an 87-79 at Texas-Arlington on Dec. 7, 1993.
Williams led the Wildcats with 16 points off the bench, while Hawkins had 15 points in a starting role. Cooke had 14 points and a team-best six rebounds, while Wentz had 11 of his 12 points in the second half. Hawkins was outstanding as he finished with those 15 points to go along with five assists, four rebounds and two steals in 28 minutes.
"This was a great team victory," Hawkins said. "We've been through a lot of adversity the last week or so, but we got after it (Monday) and got a win. In the second half, we realized that we are a good defensive team when we want to be, so we sat down and got after them each possession and came out and got a win we really needed."
The Wildcats forced 22 Bulldog turnovers and limited them to just 4 of 15 from 3-point range (26.7 percent).
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