Big second-half run propels Tulsa past ORU in Mayor's Cup

It was the type of game against ORU that drives Tulsa fans absolutely mad.

But thanks to former ORU player DaQuan Jeffries, as well as Martins Igbanu, Elijah Joiner and others, TU fans could go home from ORU's Mabee Center relieved.

Jeffries played like a man possessed in the second half, as he and Igbanu led Tulsa with 16 points apiece in Tulsa’s 69-59 Mayor’s Cup victory over ORU in front of a crowd of 4,102 Saturday night.

“It was good to see our guys in a tough environment on the road, although we had a lot of Tulsa people at the game, but on the road, to find a way to make plays to be in a position to win the game,” said TU coach Frank Haith. “We made free throws (21 of 30, 70 percent), we didn’t turn it over (three in the second half, nine total), we did all the right things to put us in a position to win the game.”

Tulsa (10-3) got out to a big lead early in the game, but as is so often the case in the series when Tulsa has the clearly better team, ORU (4-11) caught fire while Tulsa seemed to be sleepwalking.

That’s how an 18-8 lead with eight minutes left in the first half turned into a nightmarish eight-point deficits at 41-33 and 43-35 nearing the midway point of the second half.

Jeffries and the Golden Hurricane finally woke up and took the lead for good on a three-pointer by Jeffries from beyond the top of the key with 5:17 remaining. It was only 17 seconds after ORU had retaken the lead.

A blocked shot by Jeffries as the shot clock expired on ORU’s next possession fired Tulsa up some more. Igbanu added the next five points as the Hurricane extended the lead to 57-50 with 2:48 remaining.

Then Joiner made a long, wild three-pointer just before the shot clock expired with 2:01 left to expand the lead to 60-50.

“The play had broken down, and I heard my teammates yell three, two, one, and I threw up a shot, and it went in,” Joiner said.

A three-pointer off a secondary break by Jeffries with 1:41 left seemed to end the game at 63-50, but of course, ORU wouldn’t go away.

Firing three-pointers, as they had all night, the Golden Eagles did close the lead to an uncomfortable six points at 65-59 with 34.3 seconds remaining.

At that point, there were some Tulsa fans remembering the great Elite Eight team of 2000 losing a five-point lead with 20 seconds left to ORU in a head-scratching loss.

But Sterling Taplin and Curran Scott nailed all four ensuing free throws and TU could finally relax.

Jeffries had scored seven of Tulsa’s 10 points in a span of almost three and a half minutes which saw Tulsa go from being down 45-42 to being up for good at 52-50. Tulsa finally had gotten its first second half lead with a put-back by Igbanu with just under eight minutes remaining at 46-45.

Overall, Tulsa went on an amazing 26-5 run in the second half that enabled the Golden Hurricane to avoid another upset in the series.

Joiner came through off the bench with eight points (two of three on three-pointers), four rebounds, a block and an assist in 21 minutes. He scored five consecutive points with Tulsa down 43-37 to energize his teammates and the considerable fan base sitting behind the TU bench.

“He made tremendous plays down the stretch for us,” Haith said of Joiner.

Jeffries scored 11 of his 16 points in the last 8:44 of the second half, and converted on three of six three-pointers for the game.

“He had a huge block down there, and had a couple of big rebounds,” Haith said of Jeffries. “Obviously he hit the two threes there in the second half. He was big. He made plays that put us over the top.”

ORU was led by freshman DeShang Weaver, who made five of 12 shots (41.6 percent) from the field - all three-point attempts, and finished with 16 points. It wasn’t a surprise that Weaver nailed three-pointers, as he was 27 of 67 coming into the game on threes (40.7 percent), although he was only averaging 7.6 points per game.

Like Weaver, all of Sam Kearns’s shots came from behind the arc, making four of nine (44.4 percent), to finish with 12 points. He came into the game averaging 7.9 points a game and shooting 39.7 percent on three-pointers (27 of 68).

But after two early second half three-pointers, when ORU had made 10 at that point, the Golden Eagles only made two - both in the last minute - the rest of the game to finish 12 of 31 (38.7 percent) after averaging 32.9 percent coming into the game.

“They’ve got a lot of good shooters, and we knew that, and they just knocked down some tough shots,” Joiner said of ORU. “We were just more intense in the second half. We fought through adversity. This is not the first time we’ve been down before.”

ORU’s leading scorer, 6-foot-8 junior Emmanuel Nzekwesi, was held to nine points, down from his season average of 14.7 points.

Joiner didn’t have much time to celebrate after the game, having to catch a 5:30 a.m. flight home to Chicago for Christmas. The players and coaches are expected back on Dec. 27 to resume practice. Haith and his family are off to South Florida for the Christmas break.

Haith talked about how much he likes his team’s depth this season, although four of his five starters played at least 30 minutes. Overall, eight players accounted for all but five minutes of playing time for TU.

Lawson Korita (25 minutes) added eight points, while Taplin (31 minutes) had seven points, eight rebounds, six assists, no turnovers and a steal. Curran Scott (30 minutes) and Jeriah Horne (11 minutes) also each had seven points. Zeke Moore had no points in 10 minutes. Chris Barnes and Simon Falokun were scoreless in three and two minutes, respectively.

“I know we played some guys some heavy minutes tonight, but a lot of that had to do with experience in a road game, a rivalry game on the road,” Haith said. “I wanted experience out there. We will use them, because I think one of our strengths is our bench and our numbers. And we need to continue to push those guys along, because I think that will definitely help us once those guys get more minutes.”

With five consecutive wins, Tulsa has concluded a mostly successful non-conference schedule with its best non-conference record for Haith at TU, and its best since 2010.

“I feel good about where we are at,” Haith said. “I think this team will take another step and get better.”

“I think our chemistry is incredible right now going into conference play,” Joiner said. “I’m really excited, and I think it’s going to be a very good season for us this year.

Tulsa’s next game is at No. 21 Houston on Wednesday, Jan. 2.