Tulsa suffers another setback against South Florida
Eric Konkol was so disgusted in what he saw. He couldn't take it any more.
And for good reason. It would be hard for any team to play this poorly.
With TU down 29 points at 83-54 with 8:48 left in the game, it was timeout time. Tulsa had just given up another ridiculously easy layup with no defensive effort to a poor South Florida team.
Konkol quickly turned to his bench and motioned the rest of the team to come in. The only 5 available players who weren't in the game. A whole new group was coming in. No matter who.
Tulsa still ended up losing badly, but a 2-point improvement from that low mark in effort occurred, and Tulsa lost 96-69 in front of less than 1,000 fans of an announced crowd of 3,019 at the Reynolds Center Wednesday night.
"I didn't want to keep watching what I was watching," Konkol said. "I wanted to give some other guys a chance."
Out were Sam Griffin, Tim Dalger, Brandon Betson, B.B. Knight and Charles Chukwu. In came Peyton Urbancic, Ari Seals, Bryant Selebangue, Jesaiah McWright and Sterling Gaston-Chapman.
And for the final 8:48, they all stayed in. And played hard. It was still ugly, getting down by as many as 34 points. But they didn't give up..
Gaston-Chapman wound up with a plus/minus ratio of 0 in 19 plus minutes. Wanna bet he starts the next game? He finished with 8 points and 3 rebounds.
Konkol is as diplomatic as he can be, but clearly, enough was enough.
"I'm not going to watch this. It is always a privilege to play. It is an opportunity to play," Konkol said. "There is always an expectation on what it's going to look like here, so I was going to give some other guys an opportunity to do it.
"I know that we have some athletic deficiencies. We're not very big right now, we're not the most athletic, longest team. But it doesn't mean that those teams that are are always the best. It's a mindset."
When asked if he was looking to see who would be here next season by their effort, he was as nice as possible. But everyone knows the reality.
Tulsa is 5-20, 1-13 in AAC play. The Golden Hurricane has lost the last 3 games by an average of 35.7 points. TU has lost the last 5 games by a 28.8 point average.
"I think every game there is an evaluation process," Konkol said. "We plan years down the road -- our recruiting."
It is safe to say there will be a majority of new faces in Tulsa uniforms next season.
When walk-on Ari Seals and almost never used Peyton Urbancic are getting playing time, and doing better than most of the rest, some things are obvious.
Bryant Selebangue played hard the last 8:48 while teamed with hungry teammates. He finished with 21 points and 10 rebounds.
"Bryant's been so consistent for us. He went in there with that group," said Konkol. "Whatever five guys who were there, we were putting them in. He had a really good spirit about him. That's the thing about Bryant. You can just count on his consistency. He is who he is. He's that way every day."
South Florida (11-15, 4-9) won against Tulsa for the first time in 13 attempts The 0-12 streak against TU was resoundingly ended, with 7-foot Russel Tchewa leading the way with 21 points and 8 rebounds.
USF teammates Selton Miguel and Keyshawn Bryant, like Tchewa, benefitted from Tulsa's matador defense with 16 points apiece.
The Golden Hurricane got down 9-0 quickly, but rallied to take a 20-16 lead. But after being tied at 24-24, the Bulls went on a 16-1 run to go up 40-25, and the game was over.
Tulsa had only 10 players suited up for the game. Keyshawn Embery-Simpson and Nikita Konstantynovskyi were in street clothes. Point guard Anthony Pritchard missed his fourth consecutive game while not being on the bench.
For those who doubted Pritchard's value to the team, Tulsa's performance the last 4 games with him missing has been unbelievably bad. Pritchard is missed. Best wishes for the Webster HS grad.
Tulsa next plays in Philadelphia at Temple Sunday at 1 p.m.