In a game that seemingly would never end, fast-paced, full-court pressing and foul-happy Memphis was no match for DaQuan Jeffries and a determined Tulsa.
Jeffries scored a career-high 25 points to go with a team-high eight rebounds, and added three blocks, three assists and two steals to lead Tulsa to a convincing 95-79 victory over Memphis on Wednesday night in front of 4,018 fans at the Reynolds Center.
Tulsa (13-9, 3-6 AAC) got a much-needed win and a boost in confidence after three consecutive losses in great part due to an incredibly hot start where the Golden Hurricane got out to a 44-22 lead with three minutes left in the first half.
With foul-happy refs calling way too many fouls, particularly in the first half, Tulsa got into what could have been deep trouble with both of its points guards out of the game for the final six minutes of the first half.
Elijah Joiner picked up his third foul at the six minute mark on a highly questionable blocking call with Sterling Taplin already sitting on the bench with two fouls.
Rather than putting Taplin back in and risking a disastrous third foul, TU coach Frank Haith played Curran Scott at the point for the rest of the half. Scott and TU responded by boosting a 31-18 lead to 22 points before finally settling on a 48-31 halftime lead.
“We said to our guys at halftime, we weathered a storm, a big storm,” Haith said. “Because that could have been tough going for us. And Curran did a good job just holding us right where we needed to be. We handled that situation about as well as we could have handled it.”
Scott, who scored 20 points, including eight of eight free throws in the second half when Memphis was threatening to come back, was clearly up to the task of playing point guard. He had two assists and only one turnover to go with a steal and two rebounds.
“Before that even happened, Coach (Haith) said before the game started that they like to get out and pressure and deny the point guard and make it tough, so whoever the secondary ball handler was, and it was probably going to be me, I might be bringing it up just to spell (Taplin) a little bit,” Scott said. “Obviously he got into foul trouble, so that was something that I had to do. I just tried to do my best to take pressure off and take care of the ball because they were pressuring the entire game.”
Haith’s game plan took the pressure off of Scott.
“Our whole thing was we’re not going to try to beat them with the dribble,” Haith said. “We’re going to try to beat them with the pass. So we had to have good spacing and then we had to make good decisions. We weren’t going to ask Curran to do that every time by himself.”
Even though TU had thrived without its point guards, Tulsa benefited from having Taplin and Joiner back in the lineup, often together, in the second half, and boosted the lead back up to 21 points at 63-42 with 12 minutes remaining.
But Memphis (13-8, 5-3) wouldn’t go away, and its full-court press was tough to handle at times for Tulsa. The Tigers got the lead down to 11 points with just over 10 minutes left, and Golden Hurricane fans were worried about another potential blown lead.
The Tigers, however, were never able to get closer than within eight points, and didn’t get within 10 points in the last two minutes of the game. But the potential of the high-scoring, pressing Tigers for a comeback was always present until the last minute.
A key to the Golden Hurricane defeating Memphis was handling its press. Although Tulsa did have 17 turnovers, it also had a season-high 24 assists. More importantly, TU found the right balance in attacking the weak points in the Memphis press on the way to a season high in total points and first half points.
“It was important that we have a good understanding of when we had an advantage break, and when we don’t have it,” Haith said. “And I thought we did a good job of that. When we got the ball into the front court, we did a great job recognizing when we have an opportunity to score here, or if they (Memphis) did a good job of rotating and getting back. And we worked it and made them play defense.”
The Tigers got back into the game in the second half in great part due to 5-foot-9 reserve freshman point guard Tyler Harris, who scored all 18 of his points in the second half to lead Memphis including hitting four of the Tigers’ six three-pointers for the game during a short stretch.
Tulsa’s free throw shooting in the second half was outstanding, hitting 16 of 19 (84.2 percent) in the half, while connecting on 26 of 33 (78.8 percent) for the game. TU had a season high 30 field goals on 55 attempts (54.5 percent), and made nine of 20 (45 percent) three pointers.
The play of Darien Jackson, especially in the first half, was crucial, as the sophomore continues to take advantage of his increased role. His energy, especially on defense, was contagious, and he wound up with four points, six rebounds, three assists and a steal in 14 minutes.
Memphis coach Penny Hardaway had only good things to say about Tulsa’s play.
“The coaching staff of Tulsa did a great job with their game plan,” Hardaway said. “We knew they were going to play their match-up zone. They had the energy, they got a lot of deflections, they played tough, they did some really good stuff. They were the better team.”
The game may have looked like a minor upset to the casual fan, but upon closer review, it really wasn’t at all. A young Memphis team has benefited from a very favorable schedule, in conference and out of conference. The Golden Hurricane, on the other hand, just completed a brutal stretch in conference play.
By contrast, coming into the game, Tulsa's conference opponents were a combined 44-16 in conference play (counting frontrunners Houston and Cincinnati’s records twice since Tulsa played them twice). The opponents of Memphis, on the other hand, were 23-27 in conference, including three wins against teams (East Carolina, Wichita State, and Tulane) that had a combined conference record of 2-19.
If Tulsa had Memphis’ conference schedule coming into the game, it is reasonable to think Tulsa would have been 5-2 in conference play just like Memphis was. Its only win of any substance all year was at home against Central Florida - another team that has capitalized on a weak schedule.
Quite frankly, Memphis has, for the most part, played a sissy schedule. The Tigers are 11-1 at home, but 1-4 on the road and 1-3 on neutral courts. They even got spanked by 20 points by Oklahoma State earlier in the season.
“At home we’re way better,” Hardaway said. “On the road, it seems like we’re a totally different team.”
Tulsa has also been a markedly better home team, increasing its record at the Reynolds Center to 11-2, while going 1-5 on the road and 1-2 on neutral courts.
Tulsa has a reasonable shot at winning its first road game outside of Tulsa on Saturday when the Golden Hurricane travels to the Round House for a 1 p.m. game at Wichita State.
