ABILENE – The ACU Wildcats have been searching for five seasons for a signature non-conference home victory to stamp their arrival as a true NCAA Division I program.
They got it Saturday afternoon as they rallied from an 11-point second-half deficit to knock off Texas State, 72-68, in front of a large and boisterous Moody Coliseum crowd. The win is the fourth straight for the Wildcats, who are now 7-3 overall after their fifth win in their last six outings.
Texas State – which won 22 games last season in the Sun Belt Conference and is coached by former Stephen F. Austin head coach Danny Kaspar – is now 5-5 and has lost to Southland Conference opponents Houston Baptist and ACU on back-to-back Saturdays.
ACU sophomore center Jalone Friday was the best player on the floor, scoring 22 points on 9 of 16 shooting to go along with six rebounds, five blocks and one assist. Junior forward Jaren Lewis rebounded from a slow start to finish with 14 points and seven rebounds and came up with several clutch baskets in the second half.
Graduate transfer guard Tevin Foster didn't score in the first half, but had nine clutch points in the waning moments of the game to put ACU over the top. Junior point guard drew the assignment of guarding Texas State's leading scorer in Nijal Pearson, and he limited Pearson to just 11 points on 3 of 14 shooting from the field.
TURNING POINT
ACU trailed by as many as 13 points in the first half and went to halftime trailing 35-27 and with only three points from Lewis and nine from Friday. The Bobcats three pushed their lead to 11 points in the second half, the last on a three-point play by Pearson that made it a 44-33 lead with 16:34 left in the second half.
But that's when the Wildcats woke up.
Isaiah Tripp hit a 3-pointer before Lewis converted a three-point play to make it a 44-39 game. After Tyler Blount buried a 3-pointer with 14:24 to play to put the Bobcats back up 47-39, Foster buried back-to-back 3-pointers for his points of the game, cutting the Texas State lead to 47-45.
Friday then hit a jumper to knot the game at 47-47, and then ACU took the lead at 50-48 on a 3-pointer by Friday with 11:49 left in the game. With 5:48 left in the game, Texas State took a 57-56 lead on a 3-pointer by Pearson before Payten Ricks buried a corner 3-pointer on a skip pass from Franklin, putting the Wildcats on top for good at 59-57.
The Wildcats eventually pushed the lead to seven points on two different occasions as Franklin and Friday hit back-to-back layups to give ACU a 67-60 lead with 2:29 to play. But Marlin Davis hit a layup before Nedeljko Prijovic converted a three-point play and hit a 3-pointer to cut the ACU lead to 69-68 with 59 seconds to play.
That's when Foster took over as he hit a driving layup with 32 seconds to play to put ACU up 71-68. After Pearson missed a 3-pointer with 12 seconds left, the ball went out of bounds to give ACU the ball. Foster was fouled on the inbounds pass and went to the free throw line where he hit the second of two shots to put ACU up 72-68.
On the ensuing inbounds pass, Texas State guard Marlin Davis stumbled and fell trying to rush the ball up the floor, and the ball rolled out of bounds to give the ball back to the Wildcats, who ran out the final 4.7 seconds for the victory.
THREE THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW
• Saturday's game was truly a tale of two halves for each team. In the first half, Texas State hit 16 of 28 shots from the field (57.1 percent), while ACU hit just 9 of 28 shots from the field (32.1 percent). But in the second half, the Bobcats hit just 10 of 28 shots from the field (35.7 percent) compared to 17 of 30 shooting for the Wildcats (56.7 percent).
• Until Saturday, ACU hadn't beaten a non-conference NCAA Division I opponent at Moody Coliseum since a 72-61 win over Sacramento State on Dec. 4, 2014. Since that win, the Wildcats had lost four straight home games against non-conference Division I opponents.
• The win over the Bobcats is ACU's fourth non-conference NCAA Division I win this season and third straight with wins over Bowling Green, Air Force and Texas State. In the previous four seasons during ACU's transition from NCAA Division II affiliation to NCAA Division I membership, the Wildcats were a combined 6-27 against NCAA Division I non-conference competition..
THEY SAID IT
ACU head coach Joe Golding on the win …
"We were down eight at halftime because we got outplayed. Three or four years ago, I would have gone into the locker room and lost my mind. But I didn't do that (Saturday). I told them that we had gotten outplayed, but that if we outplayed them in the second we would win because I thought we were better. We did that and our guys are starting to figure out how hard you have to play to win games on this level."
UP NEXT
The Wildcats will have the week off for finals week and won't return to action until next Sunday (Dec. 17) at 1 p.m. when they take on Lipscomb in Nashville, Tenn. ACU lost to the Bisons, 75-67, in Abilene on Nov. 20.
