Jared Garcia's superhuman effort to keep Tulsa alive, combined with P.J. Haggerty's heroics, was the perfect combination.
The result was a thrilling, last second 69-67 TU victory over Charlotte on Saturday night in front of an ecstatic 3,341 fans at the Reynolds Center.
Haggerty's two free throws with 2.4 seconds remaining broke a 67-67 tie, and Charlotte's ensuing attempt to tie the game just before the buzzer was off, setting off the Golden Hurricane celebration.
"Players make plays," said Tulsa coach Eric Konkol of his team's coming through down the stretch in completing a terrific comeback victory.
Garcia had a career-high 24 points, all in the first 27 minutes of the game. Playing against his former team, where he spent his first two years in college, Garcia almost single-handedly kept Tulsa in a game where Charlotte was otherwise dominating.
It certainly looked like the 6-foot-9 Garcia was playing like a man possessed. How else to describe Garcia, who added 5 rebounds and 2 blocked shots, going an incredible 10 of 11 from the field, including 4 of 4 on three-pointers?
"That was the first time I was almost perfect," Garcia joked about his shooting percentage. "I was really tired. Just giving it all up for my team just to get the dub."
Obviously, Garcia playing against his former team got him playing at another level. Although he didn't admit it, saying, "I felt like it was just another game."
Tulsa (14-13, 5-10 AAC) looked like it might get blown out after a first half where it trailed by as many as 14 points at 37-23, and 42-31 at halftime. At that point, Charlotte (17-10, 11-4), who came into the game tied for second place in the AAC, and winner of 11 of its last 13 games, clearly looked like the better team.
However, a three-pointer by Garcia to open the second half got Tulsa going, and when he connected on his last three with 13:02 remaining, Garcia had scored more than half of TU's points at that time, and Tulsa had whittled down the Charlotte lead to 52-47.
With the momentum switched to the Golden Hurricane's side, Cobe Williams finally tied the score at 55-55 on a put back after a Haggerty miss. And Jesaiah McWright put Tulsa ahead for the first time since early in the first half with a three-pointer, his only points of the game, at 58-57 with 8:14 remaining.
It was nip-and-tuck the rest of the wat, but Haggerty came up with the shot of the game with 34.3 seconds left when he banked a long, contested three-pointer as the shot clock was going off to break a tie and give Tulsa a 67-64 lead.
Unfortunately for TU, Igor Milici, the 49er's best three-point shooter who had been throwing up mostly bricks for the majority of the game (2 of 7 of three's, 8 points), responded with an open three-pointer with 23.4 second remaining to tie the game at 67-67.
As disappointing as that was, at least Tulsa could try and play for the last shot. And Haggerty tried to do just that, dribbling the clock down to under 10 seconds before driving to the right, getting fouled by Lu'Cye Patterson from about 8 feet away to set up his game-winning free throws.
"Thankfully we were able to get to try for the last shot," said Konkol. "We emptied a side, and P.J. was able to lift his guy. Patterson comes off the ground a little bit, and draws some contact, and thankfully he was able to make that first (free throw), and we get that stop."
Haggerty, a 79.6 percent free throw shooter for the year, had struggled at the line against Charlotte, going 2 of 6 before his game-winning free throws. He rattled in his first free throw to take the lead, but then things didn't go to plan.
"We wanted P.J. to miss that shot," Konkol said of Haggerty's second free throw attempt.
"The idea was, they had no timeouts, and there was 2.4 seconds left," Konkol said. "It would be rebounded, most likely by a big, and we had Jared Garcia down there just to shade him, and to not let it just bounce, bounce. But P.J. just has a way of finding the bottom of the net, and he found the bottom of the net."
So Charlotte, with a chance to tie or win the game outright, inbounded the ball to Patterson, Charlotte's leading scorer for the season (14.2), who was 4 of 6 on three-pointers, about 70 feet away from the basket. Patterson got off 4 dribbles while driving down the court. But Haggerty was closely guarding him, and Garcia stepped up in front of the 6-2 Patterson to take away a reasonable potential three-point attempt.
Patterson, who led the 49ers with 20 points, then dished a bounce pass to 6-11 Dishon Jackson, who previously had made 5 of 7 from the field. But Jackson's 15-footer from just left of the free throw line was clearly wide right, and Tulsa had secured the important win.
It was incredibly important for the Golden Hurricane to show it can defeat a top-level AAC team - something it hadn't been able to do all season.
"This says that we are not just capable, but we are willing to do hard things," Konkol said of the win. "Because this is hard. It is hard to win high-level, Division I college basketball games. And we were able to do that today."
In Tulsa's previous struggles, including coming off a dreadful 79-63 loss at Wichita State, finding offense besides Haggerty, who leads TU in scoring at 20.3 points per game, has been challenging. Haggerty finished with 17 points, 7 assists, and 7 rebounds.
Cobe Williams, who averages 12.7 points, has been inconsistent scoring, especially lately. But his defense has usually been tenacious And his overall performance against Charlotte was inspiring, finishing with 14 points, 3 assists, 3 steals, and 2 rebounds. Williams' hustle in diving for loose balls and hustling for steals was a key against the 49ers.
"He's a great leader," Garcia said of Williams. "He's our energy."
Another important aspect of the game was that Tulsa had only 8 turnovers, while Charlotte had 10 turnovers. Both teams shot really well, with Charlotte and Tulsa shooting 51 and 50.9 percent, respectively, from the field. Charlotte made 9 of 21 (42.9 percent) on three-pointers, and Tulsa went 7 of 19 (36.8 percent). Tulsa outrebounded Charlotte 29-24. Both teams were 8 of 12 (66.7 percent) from the line.
Moving forward, a critical aspect of the Tulsa victory was that the Golden Hurricane was able to prevail with Charlotte playing well. It wasn't like the 49ers weren't impressive. Tulsa just was a little better Saturday night.
And TU's shooting 60 percent from the field in the second half was especially impressive.
Of course, if Garcia is going to come close to playing like he did against Charlotte every game, Tulsa will be in really good shape.
Coming into the game, Garcia was averaging 9 points and 5.9 rebounds per game, shooting 40.4 percent from the floor, including 30 of 98 (30.6 percent) on three-pointers.
At Charlotte, Garcia averaged 3.5 and 2.3 points, respectively, as a freshman and sophomore, and made 10 of 32 (31.3 percent) on three-pointers. Now a junior, Garcia averaged 11.8 points and 6.8 rebounds at Salt Lake City CC last season before transferring to TU.
"We know we're a good team," Garcia said. "We've just got to put those pieces together."
Tulsa had lost 84-76 at Charlotte on Jan. 10 in a game where the TU had been way down but never gave up. That game had ended with the two teams having a little scuffle after the game. That was something that was on Tulsa players minds.
"You get high, you get low, you've got to keep your emotions level, and not them getting the best of you," Garcia said about playing Charlotte again after the post-game tempers of the previous contest with the 49ers.
Tulsa's next game is at UTSA (9-19, 3-12) Wednesday night at 7 p.m., a team Tulsa defeated 107-78 on Jan. 17. UTSA is coming off a victory at North Texas. TU plays at Temple (9-17-2-11) on Saturday at 7 p.m. before finishing the regular season on Saturday, March 9 at 2 p.m. against South Florida (20-5, 13-1).
