With the game and season on the line, Lawson Korita came through with clutch shots to rescue Tulsa and give the Golden Hurricane the outright conference lead.
Saving the best for last on Senior Day, Korita played the best game of his life, scoring a career-high 20 points to lead Tulsa to a hard fought 65-54 victory over UCF Saturday in front of 5,304 appreciative fans at the Reynolds Center.
"I'm just so tickled for him. I love the kid," Haith said of Korita. "He's done everything we asked him to do. It's just so special for what he's done the last few games.
"His whole career, I look at the totality of this young man of what he's done as a student-athlete here at the University of Tulsa. It exemplifies what you want your student athlete to be in terms of being part of a team. You embrace your role and you do whatever your team needs you to do to win, and that is what this young man has done."
Tulsa (20-9, 12-4 AAC) took sole possession of first place in the conference, and will be tied for first going into the final week of the regular season. The Golden Hurricane has clinched no worse than a No. 3 seed going into the conference tournament in Fort Worth.
Having been ahead virtually the entire game, Tulsa had seen a 13-point second half lead slip to just two points at 53-51 with over three minutes remaining. Nine consecutive points on three three-pointers by the Knights had the Golden Hurricane reeling. Central Florida even had a chance to take the lead.
But then Korita made perhaps the two most important shots of his career. The first was a long-range three with two seconds left on the shot clock to put Tulsa up 56-51 with 2:28 left.
"That was big," Haith said of Korita's three-pointer. "They stun-gunned us when they went to the zone late after their three-quarter press. We never got settled into any offense. Obviously, that shot was huge because they had just made a three on the other end that was a big, big shot. It gave us a little bit of breathing room."
But the breathing room quickly turned to shortness of breath for Tulsa fans. Brandon Mahan, who had made the two previous threes for UCF, was fouled by Darien Jackson at the 2:04 mark. Mahan made all three free throws, cutting the lead back to two points.
Responding again, Korita made a jumper from the free throw line, floating into the lane with 1:41 remaining to make the score 58-54. Two free throws followed by Elijah Joiner with 46 seconds left.
"It was clutch, and at the time, it was really close, and we kind of needed that to break away," Korita said.
The most exhilarating part of the game came after two more free throws by Joiner. That is when Korita broke in front of a cross court pass for the steal. As he went in for the attempted dunk, he was undercut on a flagrant foul, so the dunk just turned into a made layup.
That is when his TU teammates mobbed him, with Joiner and fellow senior Martins Igbanu in Korita's face, gleefully yelling and slamming him into the padding underneath the basket. After that, Korita turned and fist-pumped the crowd into delirium. Korita made a final free throw as a result of the foul for the final margin of victory.
"It's sad it's my last game, but I feel like that's the way to go out," Korita said of playing his final regular season home game at the Reynolds Center. "We all played together. I'm just excited for what's next for us."
Korita was money all game, connecting on seven-of-nine from the field, including three-of-four on three-pointers.
"No. 5 had a Game," Haith said. "I'm just so proud of him. It will be a memorable evening for him."
Korita added to what has been an incredible streak for him over the last seven games. During that span, Korita has hit 17-of-31 (54.8 percent) three-pointers, and 21-of-28 (75 percent) from the field, averaging 11.7 points. His season averages are 37.7 percent on threes, 40.1 percent from the field, and 6.9 points per game.
The incredible streak coincided when Korita cut off most of his floppy blonde hair after a devastating home loss to UConn.
"It was just too long," Korita said of his hair. "I felt like I was worrying more about my hair than the game and stuff. I decided to cut it after the UConn game because I didn't have a great game and I was kind of upset. So I cut it and things just started to prosper from there."
His teammates have teased him, dubbing him "Drago" for the Ivan Drago character in Rocky IV because of the haircut.
"It's all fun, it's all love here," Korita said. "We had our senior talk last night and it was great to hear what the guys had to say about me and Martins, and we truly all love each other."
It was a terrific win for the Golden Hurricane in what was bound to be a tough game. UCF had defeated Tulsa in Orlando 20 days earlier in TU's only game without Brandon Rachal, who missed it due to a left ankle sprain.
Central Florida (14-14, 5-11) has terrific three-point shooters that always gives the Golden Hurricane fits.
Mahan was the surprise of the game for the Knights. Hitting only three of his last 21 three-pointers the last 9 games, Mahan made four-of-six from behind the arc and led UCF with 15 points. He came into the game averaging 7.0 points and 27.0 percent on threes.
But it was freshman Darin Green who Tulsa had to contain. Although he averages only 9.5 points, he was six-of-seven on three-pointers in UCF's win over Tulsa, and finished with 26 points in that game. Green played well, but was limited to a more reasonable 11 points on Saturday, and was three-of-six on three-pointers. He is shooting 40.1 percent on threes for the season.
The Knights did a good job in containing Korita's fellow senior Igbanu. Averaging 16.7 points in conference games, Igbanu was continually double and triple-teamed, finishing with 9 points.
"They did a good job on Martins in taking him away, and putting a lot of people around him," Haith said. "And that's what we talk about, when people do that, we've got some other guys that can score. Jeriah (Horne) made some big shots there. The wealth was kind of spread around."
Horne was four-of-nine on threes and scored 12 points. Rachal had 11 points, and Jackson had nine.
Rachal's presence has clearly helped TU since coming back from his sprained ankle, but Rachal was clearly affected by the injury. Before the sprain, Rachal was Tulsa's leading scorer, not to mention leading the team in rebounding and steals.
Rachal had scored in double digits in 17 of his first 20 games. After the injury, Rachal had been in double digits in scoring in just one of his last seven games.
""It was good to see Brandon again get in double figures," Haith said.
Tulsa couldn't shake a pesky UCF team that won an NCAA game last year and was a missed buzzer shot away beating Duke in the tournament and advancing to the Sweet 16. Tulsa led 27-21 at half was up 51-38 with less than eight minutes remaining.
But the three-point barrage from UCF came, and it was clear Tulsa would have to gut it out.
A big factor in Tulsa's win was rebounding. Tulsa out-rebounded UCF 30-22.
"We limited them to one shot. They only had three offensive rebounds all game, so I'm really proud of our rebounding," Haith said. "We caused 20 turnovers. We had 10 steals in the game. So, our activity, our active hands, jumping to the ball, being in the gaps, was the key. And then, once they shot it, we went and got it and rebounded the ball. Limiting them to just three offensive rebounds was big in the ball game."
Next up for Tulsa is at Temple on Wednesday night at 6 p.m., followed by the regular season finale at Wichita State at 3 p.m.Sunday afternoon.
"Today's game was awesome in terms of how we played and in terms of just finding a way," Haith said. "You just have to keep winning. All of the rest of those things will take care of itself."
