It's a shame that Jeriah Horne’s breakout game was overshadowed by the shouting match between, and eventual ejections of, coaches Frank Haith and Dan Hurley.

Still, it all turned out well for Tulsa in the end.

Horne scored a career high 27 points to go with a team high eight rebounds off the bench to lift Tulsa past UConn 89-83 on Wednesday night in front of a crowd of 3,798 at the Reynolds Center.

Tulsa (12-6, 2-3 AAC) led by as many as 17 points at 61-44 with 12:08 remaining after a Sterling Taplin three-pointer. But less than a minute later, Tulsa seemed vulnerable without Haith on the bench, and UConn seemed energized without Hurley at the helm.

Still, the closest UConn (10-8, 1-4) ever closed the margin to after that was six points - the first time with 1:16 left. TU was able to keep the margin between six and 10 points the rest of the way.

So what exactly happened to make the coaches argue with each other? And did the officials step over the line in ejecting both coaches?

“Let’s put it this way. It was competitive banter,” Haith said. “And both coaches are competitors. And I think both coaches were trying to help their team. And I think it started out like that. I don’t think it escalated to both of us being ejected, and that was disappointing.

“But there was competitive conversation. I didn’t know both of us got the first technical. I would have hoped it would have been handled a lot better than it did.”

Both coaches were doing some yelling at the refs after a questionable blocking call on DaQuan Jeffries with the score 61-49, and then Hurley started pointing towards Haith and Tulsa.

Haith took exception to it, and then Martins Igbanu, who was sitting on the floor by the scorer’s table between the coaches waiting to be checked into the game, apparently said something to Hurley, and Hurley got really agitated.

When Igbanu started leading Haith away from Hurley and was waving for Tulsa’s players to get pumped up, the officials stepped in and overreacted. Hurley started walking towards Haith to shake hands, but the officials stopped it, although they did get in a brief handshake.

“We were looking to come together and shake hands and show some sportsmanship there, but then a multitude of mishandling of it led to an embarrassment, and it looks worse on television,” Hurley said. "It’s very disappointing the way that thing was handled.”

Hurley's comments were made outside of his locker room to reporters after the game. Hurley skipped the AAC league-mandated press room interviews that the AAC had made every coach do after each game this year.

The officials, led by Pat Adams, then called two technical fouls on each coach, which resulted in automatic ejections, as well as two team fouls per team, although neither teams shot any technical foul shots.

“I’ve never seen anything like that. That was surreal,” said Hurley of the whole situation. “I was talking with the official, and I was engaged by someone on the other sideline who said my name.”

The heated exchange between the coaches was surprising considering the two have a long, friendly history between them.

“I’ve known Frank for a very long time, probably 15, 18, 20 years,” Hurley said. “When I was a high school coach he recruited my players. I feel like that situation escalated because of the officials.

“We were both fighting for calls. We were both fighting for a game we both desperately want to win. That was embarrassing. It was embarrassing for the conference, it was embarrassing for me and Frank.”

Haith also bore no ill will toward Hurley after the game.

“I’ve known Danny a long time back to when he was a high school coach and I was an assistant coach (college), and we’ve been on trips together, and my wife knows his wife,” Haith said. “If the referee knew all that we’d have been good. I think I can call him a friend.”

Assistant coach Kenton Paulino, with the help of the other Tulsa assistants, was at the helm the rest of the way, and the Golden Hurricane kept their composure in what otherwise could have been a really dicey situation.

“Coach Paulino, obviously, I recruited him (successfully as a player while Haith was an assistant at Texas), he knows what we are doing on both ends of the court,” Haith said. “I felt good about him in a leadership role there. I felt good about coach (Jim) Platt and our staff helping him through it.

“Obviously, he did a great job. I watched it. I thought he did a great job of rotation and subs, because that’s always a tough thing, who you play and when you play them, and then execution, getting the ball in bounds, and making free throws. That’s how you win tight ball games.”

Tulsa was able to get out to a sizeable lead in great part due to the exceptional play of the 6-foot-7 Horne, who was unstoppable, especially in the first half with 17 points.

Horne was stepping out and hitting difficult threes, and, when the Huskies went out to guard him on the perimeter, he made terrific drive moves while owning the UConn defenders.

Averaging 8.2 points and 19.6 minutes, and shooting 45.9 percent from the field, 40.4 percent on threes, and 72.7 from the free throw line coming into the game, Horne came through. He made eight of 11 from the field, including three of four three-pointers, as well as making all eight of his free throws.

“First off, I want to give all the glory to God,” said Horne, a former top 150 recruit out of high school, who several times pointed upward in thanks to God after a play. “Secondly, I trusted in our coaches, and our team has really come together.

“It just felt good to be out there with everybody playing hard, and playing together, and playing for each other.”

The win was a big one for Tulsa, especially after losing a late lead to Cincinnati and getting blown out at SMU during the past week.

“We came together and had some talks together as a team and we were ready to win this game,” Horne said.

Another key to the game, in a smaller sense, was the play of little-used Darien Jackson. Averaging only 0.7 points in 3.5 minutes per game in 11 games this season, Jackson played 10 of his 15 plus minutes in the first half, scoring six points on three of five from the field, and had three assists to only one turnover.

And that doesn’t even mention his defense, which is the reason why Haith put him in with Horne and Elijah Joiner as the first subs with 16:40 left in the first half.

“(Jackson) was outstanding, in terms of what he did on the court, and it was more than just his stat line, he was outstanding guarding the ball and rebounding, just being active and athletic,” Haith said. “They’ve (UConn) got some really athletic guards, so we wanted him to get out there from a defensive standpoint.

“But I thought he executed offensively very well. He made a couple of layups, but he had good ball movement. I’m really encouraged and pleased with how he played."

Tulsa was playing without 6-8 big man Simon Falokun, who was on the bench with a protective boot on his left foot. So when Igbanu was not in the game, Horne moved over from the four to the five spot against UConn’s big, athletic, but not very skilled big men.

Jeffries had another solid game with 14 points and five rebounds, while Igbanu had 13 points and five rebounds, Taplin had 11 points and five rebounds, and Curran Scott had nine points - all in the second half.

For the Huskies, guards Jalen Adams, Christian Vital and Alterique Gilbert had 27, 15 and 13 points, respectively. But Tulsa was able to hold the Huskies to nine of 31 on three-pointers (29 percent), and 42.9 percent from the field.

Meanwhile, the Golden Hurricane shot 53.7 percent from the field, made five of 13 (38.5 percent) from beyond the arc, and 26 of 36 (72.2 percent) from the free throw line.

“We felt like we had opportunities because they started switching ball screens and we were able to get some mismatches, and our guys found those out, and we didn’t force feed them,” Haith said. “I was really, really encouraged by how we finished the game and won the game."

It was only the second time Haith had ever been ejected from a game. The first came while he coaching Miami at North Carolina.

“I didn’t deserve that one, and I didn’t deserve this one, either,” Haith said.

Haith was especially excited for his team, and expressed to them his disappointment of not being with them on the court to the end.

“I apologized because I wanted them to know that we’re all in the foxhole together,” Haith said of being ejected. “I apologized for not being with them there to finish it on the court. And how proud of them I am and how they held together and stayed together and finished the game.”

Tulsa’s next game is at 11 a.m. Saturday at UCF.