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NEW ORLEANS – A regulation NCAA basketball game is 40 minutes – or 2,400 seconds if you will. On Saturday afternoon in Lakefront Arena, the University of New Orleans men's squad needed every one of those ticks, plus another 300 overtime seconds, as the Privateers outlasted Southland Conference foe Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, 73-72.
The victory snapped a five-game, head-to-head skid against the Islanders as New Orleans ran its overall winning streak to three to improve to 7-6 on the year. At 2-0 in Southland Conference play, the Privateers are now perfect in league play after a pair of games for the first time since 2006-07 as members of the Sun Belt. Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, meanwhile, dropped its third-consecutive contest to fall to 7-5 overall and 0-1 in conference action.
"It was a crazy night," UNO head coach
Mark Slessinger said. "I could say some wonderful coachspeak or philosophical stuff, but we won a crazy game. I don't know how we did it. We figured out a way to make a few plays, to make a few less wrong plays and make enough right plays. It seems like every time we get in a game with Corpus, this is the way it plays out. It was good that we came out on this side of it for once."
The two teams were deadlocked at 61-all at the end of regulation and traded blows in the early portion of the overtime period, but UNO found itself on the wrong side of a 70-69 score with 2:08 left to play in the extra period. Senior guard
Nate Frye (Human Performance & Health Promotion), who finished with a career-high 27 points and tied a career-high with nine rebounds off the bench, tied the game by sinking 1-of-2 chances from the charity stripe before fellow senior guard
Christavious Gill (IDS/Behavioral Studies) added a free throw and a layup to put the Privateers ahead, 73-70, with 45 seconds to go.
Texas A&M-Corpus Christi cut the deficit to one on the ensuing possession as Rashawn Thomas scored a put-back basket, and Islanders had a chance to win at the end. Following a UNO miss, Thomas pulled down the loose ball and dished to teammate Ehab Amin. Amin raced down the floor and put up a shot at point-blank range that bounced off the front of the rim and senior forward
Erik Thomas (IDS/Business) pulled down the rebound as the horn sounded to spark the Privateers' celebration.
Frye, who went 10-of-15 from the field with two 3-pointers and a 5-of-6 showing from the free throw line, was one of three Privateers to finish in double figures offensively as Gill and Thomas added 17 each. Thomas finished second to Frye in rebounds with eight and headlined the defensive effort with three steals. Frye and junior forward
Travin Thibodeaux (IDS/Pre-Dentistry) shared team-high assist honors with four apiece and junior forward
Makur Puou (Political Science) tallied the team's lone blocked shot.
"[Frye] gave us a huge lift," Slessinger said. "We struggled so bad offensively to start the game for whatever reason and he came in and gave us a huge spark, which we needed. He was solid defensively tonight. It was probably the best defensive night he's had since he's been back. We had really, really good effort from a lot of people."
While the team was all smiles when it was all said and done, that was hardly the case early on as UNO missed its first seven shots and committed as many turnovers while falling behind 8-0 before getting on the board at the 12:28 mark on a pair of Gill free throws. Frye followed with eight consecutive points to cap a 10-0 Privateers run and neither team was able to create much separation of the next seven-plus minutes. New Orleans and Corpus Christi were tied at 19-19 with 4:42 to play before the break, but the Privateers outscored the Islanders 10-1 the rest of the half – including a Frye 3-pointer on the final possession of the stanza – to give the home team a nine-point cushion heading into the locker room.
Texas A&M-Corpus Christi quieted any talks of a UNO runaway early in the second half and rallied to tie the game at 37-all with 13:42 to play in regulation. While that would be the theme for the remainder of the contest, the Privateers did appear poised to cruise to a relatively easy win as New Orleans led 55-49 with 2:35 to go. The Islanders, however, rallied to tie the game at 57-57 just over two minutes later.
UNO reclaimed the lead on a fast-break layup by Gill with 22 seconds to play only to see the Islanders tie the game at 59-all on a pair of Amin free throws the next time down the floor. After a Frye basket to put UNO had 61-59 with 4.2 seconds remaining, Amin converted a layup at the buzzer to set up the overtime period.
"Our guys played very unselfishly again," Slessinger added. "They played really hard and I'm so proud of how unselfish they acted. They wanted to win for the team. They didn't care who was scoring or who got the credit. We didn't play pretty. We didn't play right all the time. We had turnovers that were unforced and were unacceptable, and that's something that we have to fix, but dangonit we found a way to win and I'll take 2-0 in this 18-game run for sure."
Amin led Texas A&M-Corpus Christi with 25 points, followed by Thomas with 23 and Kareem South with 11. Amin also paced the Islanders in assists with six and shared team-high steal honors with Joseph Kilgore, South and Jake Kocher at four apiece. Kilgore led the team with seven rebounds.
The Privateers return to action on Thursday, Jan. 5, when they travel to Beaumont, Texas, to take on Lamar. From there, UNO will play at Incarnate Word on Jan. 7 before returning home to Lakefront Arena on Jan. 12 when the Privateers play host to Sam Houston State. For tickets to that game, as well as future Privateer Athletics events, contact the UNO Athletics Ticket Office over the phone at (504) 280-GAME (4263) or via the Internet by clicking
HERE.
--www.UNOPrivateers.com--
