HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — Pat Birt scored 15 points and Tulsa led almost wire-to-wire to earn a 66-60 American Athletic Conference Tournament first round victory over Tulane at the XL Center on Thursday.

"I thought our guys competed hard," said Tulsa head coach Frank Haith. "Playing these guys on Sunday, I was really disappointed in our effort down there, and I thought we came back. We had a great mindset, great focus, and defensively, we were really, really good. We just didn't make shots early in the ball game during the first half, but we still maintained our defensive focus and thought that was the key to the game."

The No. 10 seed Green Wave led for 13 seconds after Cameron Reynolds hit two free throws to give Tulane a 48-47 lead with 8:40 to play, but Sterling Taplin answered with a 3-pointer with 8:27 left to put No. 7 seed Tulsa back in front for good.

Corey Henderson Jr. scored 12 points and Taplin contributed 10 as the Golden Hurricane (15-16) earned a berth in the quarterfinals, where they play No. 2 Cincinnati on Friday night.

"I think we wrapped up our defense today," said Tulsa forward TK Edogi. "We were really disappointed we lost to them [on Sunday] and just know we wanted to get them back today."

Tulsa was just 19 of 50 from the field, including 6 of 19 from long range, but converted 22 of 31 from the free-throw line.

Reynolds scored 17 points to lead Tulane (6-25), which was just 17 of 52 from the field, including 5 of 21 from deep.

"It's a mindset we have to continue to establish with these young guys," said Haith. "Understand how hard you have to play. Understand the toughness part of it. That was the thing that was disappointing about Sunday. We didn't have the right mentality.

"I thought our guys really embraced it, and when we came out, the first possession defensively was really, really good. We set the tone from that point on, in terms of how we were going to play the game in terms of our intensity.

"There have been times all year where we had good possessions, and then when adversity hits, we've let up on the defensive end," Haith continued. "I don't think that happened. Maybe a couple possessions we lost some principal things, but I thought our effort was good throughout the ball game even when we weren't shooting the ball in the first half. Our defense kept us where we needed to be until the shots started to fall in the second half."