PROVIDENCE, R.I. - In just three days of play in week three, the American Athletic Conference is up to 10 men's basketball wins prior to Thanksgiving Day. rv/- UConn, rv/- Temple, ECU, USF, SMU and Tulane all earned victories in the past two days in addition to five Monday wins.
RESULTS
SMU 77, Wright State 76
SMU's Jimmy Whitt Jr. buried his fadeaway game-winning jumper with 4.2 seconds on the clock to give the Mustangs (3-3) a third-place finish in the 2018 Cancun Challenge Riviera Division.
Wright State (3-3) had one last opportunity on Cole Gentry's last-ditch effort, which fell short as the buzzer sounded.
Five Wright State players finished in double figures for head coach Scott Nagy. Loudon Love led the way with team highs in points (19) and rebounds (14). The Raiders shot 51% from deep (14-27) but managed only a 4-8 mark from the foul line.
Jahmal McMurray paced the Mustangs with a game-high 27 points. Ethan Chargois and Whitt Jr. also finished in double figures for SMU. Though the Mustangs weren't lights out from three-point range, they outscored Wright State 34-26 in the paint and poured in 12 second-chance points.
With 98 points, McMurray set the all-time scoring record for the Cancun Challenge.
Tulane 61, Louisiana 68
Tulane held a three-point halftime lead but was outscored by 10 in the second half of a 68-61 setback against Louisiana-Lafayette in the third-place game of the 2018 Gulf Coast Showcase at Hertz Arena.
Jordan Cornish led Tulane (2-3) with a season-high 20 points on 8-for-16 shooting to go with three steals, as Caleb Daniels added 10 points.
Marcus Stroman's game-high 26 points and three assists guided Louisiana-Lafayette (3-3), as JaKeenan Gant posted a double-double with 17 points and 11 rebounds. Justin Miller also compiled a double-double with 11 points and 14 boards.
The Green Wave owned a 30-26 scoring advantage in the paint and a 12-3 margin off the bench, but the Ragin Cajuns owned a 13-9 edge on second chances, a 48-44 victory on the glass and committed just nine turnovers to the Wave's 15.
Both sides struggled offensively in the early going with physical play at both ends of the floor, as the Green Wave forced the ball into the paint and the Cajuns coming up empty on nine of their first 11 shots.
The Green Wave made their move late, working their way to the free throw line, as Bul Ajang connected on a pair with 1:03 left to pull his team within two, 63-61.
Louisiana-Lafayette closed the game with five straight points, all at the foul stripe, to seal the win.
The Wave held the Cajuns to just 30 percent shooting in the second half, but they were able to convert 14 of 18 free throws in the period. Tulane went just 8-for-15 (.533) at the charity stripe and made just one 3-pointer in the final 20 minutes.
ECU 76, Prairie View 64
Freshman Jayden Gardner and junior Seth LeDay each posted a double-double to lead ECU past Prairie View A&M Wednesday night, 76-64, in their final game of the Deep South Showcase.
The Pirates (4-2) finished the round robin event with a record of 3-1, defeating Lamar, Texas Rio Grande Valley and Prairie View at home while suffering its only loss of the showcase at Georgia Tech.
Gardner led all scorers with a game-high 28 points and pulled down a career-best 17 rebounds for his second double-double of the season. LeDay added 13 points and a career-high 11 rebounds for his first double-double of the season.
Sophomore Shawn Williams, who made his season debut following an indefinite suspension, scored 18 points.
The Pirates scored 10 consecutive points over a four-minute stretch early in the second half, breaking a tie at 35, getting four points from Gardner and senior Isaac Fleming before the spurt was capped by a layup from K.J. Davis, who finished with a career-high nine rebounds, for a 45-35 lead with 14 minutes remaining.
Prairie View (1-5) answered with nine straight points to pull within one, but Williams silenced the run with his fourth 3-pointer of the game. Williams finished the game 4-of-9 outside the 3-point arc.
The Pirates held a three-point lead with nine minutes left and stretched their advantage to 11 over the next 4:28 and led by 13 with two minutes to play.
After shooting less than 30 percent in the first half, ECU found its stroke in the second and connected on 61.5 percent of its field goal attempts (16-of-26), which included 7-of-8 makes by Gardner.
ECU's defense held the Panthers to 33.8 percent from the floor (22-of-65) and 14.3 percent (3-of-21) outside the 3-point arc. Georgia Tech is the only team to shoot better than 30 percent from downtown against the Pirates this season.
USF 69, Florida A&M 59
Alexis Yetna scored 15 points and added 10 rebounds for his second consecutive double-double to lead USF to a 69-59 victory over Florida A&M Wednesday evening at the Yuengling Center.
Yetna scored 11 points and grabbed a career-high 17 rebounds Sunday against Georgetown and leads the American Athletic Conference with 9.6 rebounds per game. David Collins added 21 points, four assists and two steals for his second straight game of at least 20 points.
Michael Durr tied a career-high with 11 rebounds to help the Bulls outrebound Florida A&M 42-28.
Justin Ravenel led Florida A&M with 14 points and made three 3-pointers, while both D.J. Jones and Rod Melton added 12 points for a Rattlers team that suffered its seventh straight loss to USF.
USF and Florida A&M went back-and-forth for the opening 16 minutes of the first half before the Bulls used an 8-1 run over the final 3:07 to build a 36-27 lead at halftime.
A three-pointer by Collins just over five minutes into the second half gave USF it's largest lead at 44-30. Florida A&M pulled within five points on a trey from Ravenel at the 6:33 mark, but the Bulls responded with a 9-0 run that included seven points from Collins to extend their advantage back to 14 points.
rv/- Temple 76, Cal 59
With a 44-point second half, Temple men's basketball surged ahead in the second half to defeat Cal (1-3) by a score of 76-59 in the GotPrint.com Legends Classic presented by Old Trapper. It was the last of four Legends Classic games for the Owls (5-1), who got 23 points from junior Quinton Rose and a double-double in points and assists from senior Shizz Alston, Jr.
Once the Owls scored their second bucket of the game, they never trailed again. Temple's largest first-half lead was 14 points, and the Owls led by as many as 19 points in the final minute of the contest.
Although the disparity in turnovers and rebounds only slightly favored Temple in both, the Owls took full advantage. They finished with a 16-3 lead in points off turnovers and a 12-2 lead in second-chance points.
The Owls got assists on an impressive and season-high 24 of 31 buckets. Alston's career-tying 10 assists led the way. Temple hit 19 second-half field goals to Cal's 10, with Rose scoring 14 of his game-high 23 points in the latter period.
Alston's points-assists double-double of 15 points and 10 assists is the second of his career. Rose made 11-of-20 from the field en route to his 23 points while also recording a game-high four steals.
Sophomore Nate Pierre-Louis had another strong stat line, adding five assists, three steals and two blocks to nine points and nine rebounds.
Tulane 55, UC Irvine 67
Tulane got off to another hot start and played strong defense down the stretch, but UC Irvine used an early second-half scoring surge to top the Green Wave, 67-55, in the semifinals of the Gulf Coast Showcase Tuesday evening at Hertz Arena.
Caleb Daniels led Tulane (2-2) in scoring for the third straight game with 14 points to go with three rebounds and a game-high five assists.
The score was deadlocked at 25-all at the first half but UC Irvine caught fire in the second to outscore Tulane, 42-30 in the second to improve to 6-0.
Collin Welp paced the Anteaters with 15 points and four assists with three 3-pointers made, while John Edgar, Jr., tallied 13 points.
Both Blake Paul and Samir Sehic scored eight points and pulled down seven rebounds
SMU 62, Bradley 75
Elijah Childs had a career-high 21 points and 12 rebounds for his first double-double of the season and Bradley beat SMU 75-62 on Tuesday night in the Cancun Challenge.
Bradley took its first double-digit lead at 47-37, on a Koch Bar free throw, as SMU was outscored 19-9 over the first 10 minutes of the second half.
Dwayne Lautier-Ogunleye made a reverse layup to extend Bradley's lead to 63-55, and Childs blocked a shot at the other end. SMU missed two shots in the lane on its next possession and Lautier-Ogunleye sank two free throws with 2:31 to go.
Bar finished with 15 points and Darrell Brown 14 for Bradley (4-1). Childs had nine points and seven rebounds in the first half as the Braves led 30-28.
Jahmal McMurray scored 19 points for SMU (2-3), and Jimmy Whitt Jr. had 12 points and 13 rebounds.
UConn 91, Cornell 74
Picking up the win following a two-game road trip, the UConn men's basketball team coasted to a 91-74 win over Cornell Tuesday night at the XL Center.
The Huskies shot 51 percent from the field, 83 percent from the stripe and forced 19 turnovers on the defensive end. UConn improves to 4-1 on the year, while the Big Red falls to 3-3.
Senior Jalen Adams led the Huskies in scoring with 21 on 9-for-16 shooting from the floor. Junior Christian Vital poured in 19 points, while Tarin Smith, Alterique Gilbert and Tyler Polley added 12, 11, and 10 points apiece, respectively.
After trailing 23-20 midway through the first period, the Huskies used a 28-10 run over the final 9:06 to take a commanding 48-33 lead into the halftime break. Freshman Brendan Adams tallied eight points over that run, with Christian Vital chipping in seven.
The second half provided minimal defense, as the teams traded bucket-for-bucket and combined for 84 second-half points. Senior Matt Morgan led the Big Red with 26 points on the night.
Four Huskies finished the game in double-figures, with freshman Brendan Adams narrowly missing the mark (8 points).
UConn outscored Cornell 44-30 in the paint and scored 25 points off the Big Red's mishandles. 16 second-chance points were produced from the 11 offensive rebounds pulled down by the home team. Overall, UConn outrebounded Cornell 35-29.
UPCOMING GAMES