HUNTSVILLE — On a day of upsets throughout the Southland Conference, one of the youngest teams in the league grew up a bit in the fourth quarter as the ACU Wildcats rallied from a 13-point second-half deficit to beat Sam Houston State, 75-72, at Johnson Coliseum.
And it was leading scorer
Breanna Wright who was up to her old tricks as she scored a career-high 31 points while hitting seven 3-pointers to lead the ACU comeback.
While the Wildcats were falling behind the Bearkats by double digits in the second half, previously unbeaten Stephen F. Austin, third-place Central Arkansas and fifth-place New Orleans were all losing in upset fashion. Lamar — which SFA — is now in first place at 10-1, while SFA is in second at 9-1. ACU and Central Arkansas are tied for third at 8-3, while UNO remains in fifth at 7-5. ACU is 14-7 overall and is now 8-1 overall against Sam Houston since re-joining the Southland Conference in 2013-14.
After leading by as many as 11 points in the first half, the Wildcats watched the Bearkats take advantage of a curious charge call on
Sara Williamson to outscore ACU 13-0 over the final 4:57 of the first half to take a 40-36 lead into halftime. That lead swelled to 13 points in the third quarter, thanks to an 11-0 run over a three-minute stretch that gave the Bearkats a 54-41 lead with 5:25 left in the third quarter.
But ACU closed the third quarter on a 10-2 run sparked by five points from Wright and three from freshman guard
Kayla Galindo, who finished with eight points off the bench, all coming in the second half.
The game got really interesting with 4:34 to play when Williamson hit a backdoor layup on a great feed from
Lexi Kirgan to cut the Sam Houston State lead to 68-63. Almost two minutes later, Galindo buried a 3-pointer after a pass from
Sierra Allen to make it a 68-66 game. On Sam Houston State's ensuing possession, Kirgan came up with a huge steal that led to a foul on McKinney on a Galindo drive to the basket. Galindo calmly stepped to the line and buried two free throws to tie the game at 68 apiece with 2:20 to play.
Sam Houston State answered on its next possession as Lydia Baxter hit a layup on a pass from Akarian Morgan to give the Bearkats a 70-68 lead with 2:08 left. Wright then missed a pair of 3-pointers, but the third time was a charm as she took a feed from Williamson, got a great screen from Allen and drained a 3-pointer to give her team a 71-70 lead with 45 seconds to play.
The Bearkats, however, regained the lead with 34 seconds left when Morgan hit a layup on a pass from Rachel Harrell to make it 72-71. But Wright was fouled as she drove inside on ACU's ensuing possession and her two free throws gave ACU a 73-72 lead with 19 seconds to play.
Sam Houston State called timeout and advanced the ball into the front court to try and get off the game-winning shot. Williamson tipped the inbounds pass away on the Bearkats' first attempt, but was whistled for a non-shooting foul trying to grab the loose ball. On the next attempt, Williamson again tipped the ball away and it ended up in Wright's hands and she was fouled with 12 seconds to play.
Wright — an 88 percent free-throw shooter entering the game — hit both free throws to give ACU a 75-72 lead. Sam Houston State had potential game-tying 3-pointers from both Jenniffer Oramas and Harrel in the final seconds, but both were off the mark and the Wildcats were able to escape with a huge comeback win.
NOTES
• The Wildcats had just four second-half turnovers after committing nine turnovers in the first half.
• Wright — who hit 8 of 14 3-pointers last Wednesday in a loss at Lamar — finished 7 of 10 from 3-point range Saturday against the Bearkats. She's now shooting 35.8 percent from 3-point range this season (49 of 137).
• After three straight Southland Conference road losses (at SFA, at UCA, and at Lamar), the Wildcats snapped that streak with just their second road win of the season. The other road win was a Jan. 3 win at McNeese. ACU also has a neutral-court win over Old Dominion in the Las Vegas Holiday Hoops Classic on Dec. 22.
QUOTABLE
"Sam Houston State played really tough (Saturday). They got a lot of fuel from their game against McNeese last Wednesday (a 66-63 loss), and they played with a lot of passion (Saturday). They were very physical with us on the inside and played us very tough. Hopefully we learned some lessons in terms of how hard you have to play defensively to win games like this. But we grew up and got some huge stops late in the game from Sierra, Lexi and Sara." — ACU head coach Julie Goodenough
