BOWLING GREEN, Ky. — With an inbounds pass underneath its own basket in a tie game with 0.6 second left on the road, the only strategy available to the Indiana State’s men’s basketball team to pull out a miracle victory over Western Kentucky was a wing-and-a-prayer.
The “wing” was deadly accurate. The prayer was answered by a whistle. The miracle was delivered by a Rashad Reed free throw as ISU pulled off a stunning 64-63 victory in front of an apoplectic crowd of 2,269 at WKU’s Diddle Arena.
WKU had just wiped out a nine-point deficit in the span of less than two minutes when Jameson Tipping made a miraculous play of his own, a long, off-balance game-tying 3-pointer. Harry Marshall was charged with delivering the inbounds pass to try and make the longest of long-shot miracles come true for the Sycamores.
As he scoped his options, he saw Reed break off toward the ISU 3-point line on the left wing.
“With 0.6 seconds, all you can do is catch and shoot, I knew we had time for that. The idea was to just get it down the floor and see what happens,” Marshall said.
Marshall hurled a perfect lob to Reed, who caught the ball and released it with one motion. WKU center Jeremy Evans, who was trying to get to the ball, ran into Reed as he attempted his shot. Official Tim Gattis blew his whistle, calling a foul on Evans, and Reed went to the line.
“They were cheating over to Jake [Kelly]. Harry and I made eye-contact and he threw it. I tried to make the shot, he got my arm, it was a good call,” Reed said.
Reed converted one free throw with 0.1 on the clock to cap a wild finale for the Sycamores in the Dick’s NIT Season Tipoff.
“It was a great play by Rashad, a toughness play. It symbolized how tough we played all night,” Marshall said.
There was contact on the play, but it’s a call that’s rarely made in that situation, particularly for a road team. The officials conferred to confirm that Reed got his shot off (the buzzer went off at the conclusion of the play) and said that he did.
“It’s their home-court, I didn’t think I was going to get the call. I was really just trying to make the shot, I wasn’t expecting the call,” Reed said.
ISU coach Kevin McKenna said it was the right call.
“There was a lot of contact, I thought the officials made the right call. Do the officials always call it in that situation? No. But there was contact and it was clearly a foul in my eyes,” McKenna said.
WKU coach Ken McDonald was disappointed, but philosophical.
“That’s a tough situation at the end where both guys are going for the ball and one guy had more momentum. Once that ball is up in the air that long, it’s anyone’s ball, McDonald said. “That’s a tough break at the end, but it shouldn’t have come to that. The game was lost for us in the first 39 minutes, 59 seconds, not the last point-six seconds.”
The play gave ISU a major lift, not only after it lost to Coastal Carolina on Monday, but because the Sycamores had controlled most of the game until WKU made a run in the final two minutes. ISU’s win ended WKU’s 15-game home-court winning streak.
“Our guys showed character and played tough throughout the game. We controlled the tempo of the game. I thought we made plays for each other better and competed on the glass against a tournament-tested team,” McKenna said.
ISU (4-2) built its lead thanks to a first half surge fueled by rebounding and their bench. Josh Crawford scored all six of his points in the first half and Aaron Carter fought hard on the boards as the Sycamores built a 35-21 halftime lead. ISU had a 23-14 rebounding edge at the break. WKU guard A.J. Slaughter, who averages 18.7 points per game, was held scoreless. WKU forward Sergio Kerusch, who averages 20.7, had two points.
ISU led by as much as 16 in the second half, and though WKU made a few runs in the last 10 minutes, a Marshall three-point play with 1:51 left, put ISU up 62-53 and seemingly put the Sycamores in good stead.
Not so. Slaughter, who left the game early in the second half with a head injury, took over for the Hilltoppers. He scored a circus layup with 1:38 left to cut ISU’s lead to seven and when Dwayne Lathan threw the ball away against WKU’s press, Tipping found Slaughter for a 3-pointer to make it 62-58 with 1:21 remaining. Slaughter scored all 20 of his points after his head injury.
WKU cut the deficit to 63-60 when Slaughter missed a game-tying 3-pointer with 27 seconds left. Lathan was eventually fouled, but missed a pair of free throws with 14.1 seconds left to keep the Hilltoppers alive.
Tipping, who played just nine minutes, found the ball in his hands when ISU wisely elected to close up on Slaughter. The freshman was several feet behind the 3-point stripe when he leaned around an ISU defender and fired off a shot that found nothing but net. Diddle Arena exploded as WKU had wiped out its deficit to tie the game, but the mood went from joyous delirium to rage after the Marshall-to-Reed game-winning connection played out.
ISU went 2-2 in the Preseason NIT. The Sycamores complete a span of seven games in 16 days when they travel to Arkansas State on Sunday.
Indiana State 64
min fg 3pt ft r a pf pt
Lathan 20 5-8 2-3 3-6 5 0 4 15
Kelly 35 2-6 0-3 5-6 5 0 4 9
Leitnaker 17 0-1 0-0 0-0 3 0 3 0
Reed 25 3-10 0-4 3-4 4 5 2 9
Marshall 28 3-5 0-1 1-1 4 0 3 7
Doluony 20 2-7 1-4 2-2 3 0 0 7
Crawford 23 3-4 0-0 0-0 6 1 1 6
Printy 12 3-6 1-4 0-0 3 1 0 7
Carter 20 1-3 0-0 2-2 2 1 1 4
Totals 22-50 4-19 16-21 38* 8 18 64
Western Kentucky 63
min fg 3pt ft r a pf pt
Kerusch 31 1-8 1-5 0-0 2 2 2 3
Pettigrew 31 5-13 0-1 3-4 8 0 2 13
Evans 28 2-7 0-0 1-3 7 0 4 5
Slaughter 35 7-16 4-10 2-3 5 2 2 20
Sally 22 3-6 0-3 1-2 5 2 3 7
Dixon 14 1-2 0-1 0-1 4 0 2 2
Dickerson 18 1-3 1-2 0-0 3 1 1 3
Tipping 9 2-2 2-2 0-0 0 1 1 3
Crook 5 0-1 0-0 0-0 0 1 0 0
Milosevic 7 2-2 0-0 0-2 0 0 0 4
Totals 24-60 8-24 7-15 34* 9 17 63
Halftime score — ISU 35, WKU 21. FG Pct. — ISU .440; WKU .400; 3P Pct. — ISU .211; WKU .333; FT Pct. — ISU .762; WKU .467. Steals — ISU 6 (Reed 3); WKU 4 (Tipping 2). Blocks — ISU 2 (Crawford 2), WKU 1 (Evans). Turnovers — ISU 16 (Lathan 3, Kelly 3, Reed 3), WKU 11 (Sally 5). Team rebounds* — ISU 3, WKU 0. A — 2269.
Next — ISU (4-2) will play at Arkansas State on Sunday. WKU (2-2) will play at South Carolina on Dec. 2.
College
Miracle play lifts Indiana State men to victory in stunner
Reed converts free throw with 0.1 remaining to end WKU home winning streak
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