A week ago, Tim Niles had to give up the ball, and Emporia State never got off a shot to try to tie the game at Central Oklahoma.
On Monday night, Niles got a second chance.
With 6.1 seconds left and the Hornets trailing by two, ESU coach David Moe called a time out and drew up a play for Niles with Lamar Wilbern as the second option.
Niles got the ball near the top of the key, and as he surveyed the court, he lost his dribble. Central Oklahoma stole the ball and escaped with another win over the Hornets, 76-73.
“I told him in the locker room afterwards, ‘Tim, I want the ball in your hands in that situation every time. I’ve got confidence in you next time you have that chance,’” Dustin Andrews said.
The Hornets now have two impressive showings against the 17th-ranked Bronchos, including a record shooting night at UCO last week that included a 45-point performance from Niles and a school-record 78.3 percent performance from beyond the arc.
In the rematch, they rallied from a 10-point deficit with five minutes left and had a chance to tie the game.
Yet all they have to show for their effort is two key Regional losses and a 1-2 record.
“Coming back and getting close isn’t necessarily what we’re striving to do,” Moe said. “We’ve got to get better defensively, and there’s a lot of areas we’ve got to improve on to compete at the top of the conference.”
The Bronchos created the blueprint on Monday night for slowing down Emporia State’s offense and the hot-shooting Niles.
Niles was held to just four shots — he made three — and eight points. The Bronchos knew where Niles was at all times and constantly shadowed him, often double-teaming him when he had the ball.
So the strategy was obvious: Make someone else beat you.
With Niles patiently waiting for his shot and creating for his teammates early on, the Hornets came out hot again and shot 57.7 percent in the first half, including a solid 5-of-10 from beyond the arc.
The Bronchos also maintained their hot shooting from a week ago and shot 68 percent in the first half and led 46-43 at halftime.
UCO played a zone in the second half, which the Hornets struggled to score against and also shortened the game because of longer possessions.
“We didn’t attack the zone, and we didn’t do anything that you’re supposed to do out of it,” Moe said. “We just passed it around the perimeter and stood on the perimeter and waited for someone to fall down before we would do anything. You’ve got to attack gaps and seams, look inside and attack from there. That’s not what we did.”
The Bronchos built their 10-point lead, and the Hornets were out of sorts offensively, but they used a couple of big stops defensively and two big baskets from Wilbern to go on a 9-1 run.
Wilbern knocked in a deep 3-pointer on the wing with the shot clock winding down and also scored on a putback of his own miss to cut the lead to two, 75-73.
Wilbern played on a sprained left ankle, which he practiced on for the first time Sunday. He led the Hornets with 18 points and 11 rebounds, nearly willing the team to another overtime.
“Lamar is a player,” Andrews said. “He’s a great player, and he’s going to do that all year. We kind of feed off of what he does and make plays off of him. He played well, and that’s what gave us all that momentum toward the end.”
Wilbern followed his putback with a steal, which gave ESU the ball with a chance to tie. The Hornets got the ball to Andrews in the middle of the zone, and he turned to attack the paint. Andrews scored on a leaner, but the basket was waved off and Andrews was called for a charge, his fifth foul.
“I tried to avoid it as much as possible,” he said. “I didn’t see the guy, whether he was completely set or not. It’s a tough call in that situation and you just have to go with what he calls. ... I thought I avoided him enough to where it was either a no-call or a block, at least.”
The Hornets got the ball back with a second chance to tie the game, but Jeremiah Box missed a 3-pointer and Wilbern stepped on the baseline after rebounding the miss.
UCO’s Eric Cazenave missed the front-end free throw of a one-and-one with 16.6 seconds left, which gave the Hornets their final chance to tie the game, but it ended with Niles’ turnover.
The Hornets need to bounce back quickly with another difficult nonconference game ahead, opening the SBU Classic on Friday against Dallas Baptist, the preseason favorite to win the Heartland Conference.
“The Dallas Baptist game is huge,” Moe said. “We’ve got to get better, play with confidence and aggression. We didn’t have that tonight. We were tentative, whereas at their place last week we were aggressive. Here we were tentative and playing not to lose, and we lost.”
Monday at White Auditorium
Central Oklahoma 76, Emporia State 73
Central Oklahoma 46 30 — 76
Emporia State 43 30 — 73
CENTRAL OKLAHOMA (2-2)
Livingston 7-7 4-5 18, Cazenave 5-11 1-3 15, Williams 5-9 1-2 13, Carroll 4-6 2-3 12, Phillips 3-7 2-2 8, Marks 2-3 2-3 6, Friday 1-2 0-0 2, Rhymes 1-6 0-0 2, Sanders 0-0 0-0 0, Curry 0-1 0-0 0. Totals 28-52 12-18 76.
EMPORIA STATE (1-2)
Wilbern 8-15 1-5 18, Holthaus 5-9 3-4 13, Andrews 3-5 4-4 12, Stout 3-6 0-0 8, Niles 3-4 0-0 8, Box 2-5 1-2 6, Boswell 0-2 4-6 4, Euler 1-6 0-0 2, Moore 1-1 0-0 2. Totals 26-53 13-21 73.
3-point goals — Central Oklahoma 8-20 (Cazenave 4-7, Williams 2-5, Carroll 2-4, Rhymes 0-1, Curry 0-1, Phillips 0-2), Emporia State 8-21 (Andrews 2-4, Stout 2-4, Niles 2-3, Box 1-4, Wilbern 1-3, Euler 0-2, Boswell 0-1). Fouled out — Central Oklahoma: None, Emporia State: Andrews. Rebounds — Central Oklahoma 29 (Williams, Dauntae 6), Emporia State 30 (Wilbern 11). Assists — Central Oklahoma 19 (Williams 9), Emporia State 14 (Boswell 4). Total fouls — Central Oklahoma 18, Emporia State 21. Att. — 1,484.
ESUGrad77 (anonymous) says...
What an exciting game, tough one to lose.
Hopefully we will see them in the NCAA later this year.
Corky sure tried hard to get the crowd going, he is the best 6th man we have ever had.
November 24, 2009 at 4:14 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )