The UCA men’s basketball team defeated the University of North Carolina Asheville 92-84, stifling the Bulldogs’ bark in a double overtime victory Nov. 24.
UCA coach John Shulman said, “You either win or learn. And we gave up one away at Western Illinois, we missed free throws to beat SEMO [Southeast Missouri University] and we have a young team. We have the 16th least experienced team in America, but we learned, and we about did the same thing tonight and figured out a way to pull a loss out of the jaws of victory.”
This was the Bears’ (2-4) second win of the season, the first being a 108-49 triumph against the Randall University Saints.
UNC Asheville graduate student guard Fletcher Abee scored a 3-pointer in the first ten seconds of the game, giving the Bulldogs a headstart on the scoreboard.
The Bulldogs (2-3) attempted 40 3-pointers throughout the game, bagging 15 total. While the Bulldogs’ attempted 3-pointers far surpassed the Bears’ 27 attempts, UCA scored seven 3-pointers, not far off from UNC’s final total.
Shulman said, “They made threes and they didn’t make a whole lot of twos tonight now did they? And that’s our deal. So we want to keep people off the foul line, keep people off glass and keep people out of paint.”
UCA attempted 66 field goals and 28 free throws, scoring a total of 32 field goals and 21 free throws. The Bulldogs scored a total of 30 field goals and 8 free throws against an attempted 30 field goals and 13 free throws.
UNC graduate student guard Josh Banks continued the Bulldogs’ 3-pointer streak, scoring two back-to-back before the Bears scored a 2-point jump shot from sophomore guard Michael Evbagharu.
With 16 minutes and 20 seconds left of the first half UCA managed to tie the game 9-9, senior guard/forward Ellias Cato scoring the Bears a much-needed 3-pointer.
After both teams climbed to 11 points each, the Bears finally took the lead by 2 points from a jump shot from freshman guard Layne Taylor.
By the end of the game, Taylor garnered eight field goals, tying Cato for most field goals scored.
The basketball Bears would lead for the rest of the first half, 38-30, with sophomore guard Brayden Fagbemi landing the final 3-point shot.
Taylor said, “We were kind of the aggressor to start the game and set the tone. I think we need to continue to do that going forward.”
Fagbemi began the second half with another 3-pointer, giving UCA an 11-point lead.
Seven and a half minutes later the Bulldogs began to climb the point-ladder as senior forward Toyaz Solomon scored a layup in the paint, putting UNC only 6 points behind the Bears, 53-47.
The Bulldogs would eventually surpass the Bears with a 3-pointer from Abee over 10 minutes into the game, 55-53.
The Bears would lead with 8 points nearly 18 minutes into the second half, UNC closing the gap with two free throws by sophomore guard Jordan Marsh.
The second half would end with a tie, 71-71 after Marsh made another two successful free throws.
Marsh would begin the overtime period with a layup in the paint, putting the Bulldogs ahead by two points. Both teams would continue to trade the lead until the Bears pulled 3-points ahead in the final 45 seconds with a jump shot from Taylor, 79-76. However, with 33 seconds left, Abee bagged the Bulldogs a game-tying 3-pointer, pushing the game into a second overtime period.
The Bears took the lead at the beginning of the period with a layup by Evbagharu. This marked the beginning of the end, as the Bulldogs would never be able to regain the lead on UCA. Although the game ended with a jump shot from UNC’s Toyaz, it wasn’t enough to catch back up, UCA proving to have more bite than bark with a final score of 92-83.
Heading into the next game, Shulman hopes that the Bears can focus on “getting some confidence and feeling better about ourselves.”
“We feel better about ourselves because we finally won a tight one and won a big game. But you know, it doesn’t get any easier,” he said.
The UCA men’s basketball team will face the sting of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets at noon Nov. 30 in Atlanta, Georgia.