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Contributed by: Lance Fleming, ACU Associate Director of Athletics for Media Relations
ABILENE - The calendar reads February, but it sure felt like March in Moody Coliseum late Saturday afternoon.
Freshman Jaren Lewis banked in a halfcourt prayer just before the buzzer sounded to end the game to give the Wildcats an 87-84 win over New Orleans in a game that brought a sense of March Madness to a boisterous crowd that filled the arena.
The ACU Wildcats rallied from a four-point deficit in the final 28 seconds to capture an improbable win over the Privateers, who are fighting for positioning in the Southland Conference Post-Season Tournament, which starts in two weeks. That tournament will send its winner to the NCAA Tournament and the beginning of March Madness. However, the madness got an early start Saturday in Abilene.
"It's been a lot of years since we've had one of those things go our way," ACU head coach Joe Golding said of Lewis' game-winning 3-pointer. "But when you're trying to change the culture and turn a program around, you have to have something like that happen. We had a chance to get a game-winning layup against Nicholls early in conference play (Jan. 9), but we didn't get it because we didn't play well enough to deserve. Tonight we deserved for the ball to bounce our way."
UNO certainly appeared to have everything going in its direction, rallying from five points down to lead 83-79 with 28 seconds left after a pair of free throws from Nate Frye. But ACU freshman Jaylen Franklin - who was sensational again with a game-high 28 points --- went strong to the bucket on the Wildcats' ensuing possession, converting a layup and the and-one free throw to cut the UNO lead to 84-82 with 12 seconds to play.
ACU fouled Frye intentionally on the inbounds play, and after hitting the first free throw, he missed the second and Austin Cooke picked up the defensive rebound, giving the Wildcats a chance to tie or win the game in regulation.
They did both.
After a timeout, Franklin took the inbounds pass and sprinted up the floor, moving easily through the entire UNO defense for the game-tying layup with 5.8 seconds to play. After a brief officials' review to re-set the game clock, ACU had a chance to set its defense, and that resulted in the play of the season for the Wildcats.
Frye got the inbounds pass and sped to halfcourt where he was met by Franklin, who swiped the ball out of his hands. Despite being swarmed by a possee of Privateers, Franklin got the ball out of his hands to his left where Lewis was waiting without a single UNO defender in front of him. He caught the ball, launched it and watched it bank in just as the buzzer sounded to end the game.
Then, pandemonium from the bench, the scorer's table, and the assembled crowd, which had swollen to almost 2,000 in the second half as fans began to trickle in for the UIL girls' basketball regional championship game between Eula and Roby.
"I saw their guard (Frye) get past a couple of defenders and I thought I would step in and meet him at halfcourt," Franklin said. "The ball just popped right up in front of my face and I grabbed it. I kind of saw Jaren out of the corner of my eye and got it to him."
"When I saw J-Frank make the steal, I thought I should get toward halfcourt and see if there was anything I could to help him," said Lewis. "He kind of got into a mess and then when I got the ball, my first reaction was to catch and shoot because I knew we didn't have much time left in the game. I was hoping it was going to go in."
It did, it kept ACU's Southland Conference record at Moody Co-liseum perfect this season at 6-0 and pushed the Wildcats to 13-16 overall and 8-8 in the league. The Wildcats - who trailed by as many as eight points late in the first half and six points in the second half - have doubled their conference win total for the second straight season, from two in 2013-14 to four in 2014-15 to eight in 2015-16 with two home games left on the schedule.
"There's a fine line between winning and losing, and that was on display (Saturday)," Golding said. "To be able to turn a program around, you have to win some recruiting battles, and we've won a lot of those in the last year. Then you have to start winning at home, and we've started doing that this year. The next step is to learn to win on the road, and we're still going through that process. But this was a special night and a special win and a huge step in our building process. Sometimes you need a win like that one to springboard you to even greater success. "
Franklin led four players in double figures with those 28 points, while Lewis finished with 13 points and seniors Jalen Little and Parker Wentz with 15 and 10 points, respectively.
Little was huge, scoring those 15 points to go along with two rebounds, five assists and one steal in 33 minutes, while Wentz overcame getting run over on a charge call early in the second half to score those 10 points and get two rebounds and two steals in 30 minutes.
"Our guys didn't quit (Saturday night) and they found a way to win," Golding said. "We're going to change this program by getting talented winners in here, and that's exactly how we won this one."
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ABILENE - The calendar reads February, but it sure felt like March in Moody Coliseum late Saturday afternoon.
Freshman Jaren Lewis banked in a halfcourt prayer just before the buzzer sounded to end the game to give the Wildcats an 87-84 win over New Orleans in a game that brought a sense of March Madness to a boisterous crowd that filled the arena.
The ACU Wildcats rallied from a four-point deficit in the final 28 seconds to capture an improbable win over the Privateers, who are fighting for positioning in the Southland Conference Post-Season Tournament, which starts in two weeks. That tournament will send its winner to the NCAA Tournament and the beginning of March Madness. However, the madness got an early start Saturday in Abilene.
"It's been a lot of years since we've had one of those things go our way," ACU head coach Joe Golding said of Lewis' game-winning 3-pointer. "But when you're trying to change the culture and turn a program around, you have to have something like that happen. We had a chance to get a game-winning layup against Nicholls early in conference play (Jan. 9), but we didn't get it because we didn't play well enough to deserve. Tonight we deserved for the ball to bounce our way."
UNO certainly appeared to have everything going in its direction, rallying from five points down to lead 83-79 with 28 seconds left after a pair of free throws from Nate Frye. But ACU freshman Jaylen Franklin - who was sensational again with a game-high 28 points --- went strong to the bucket on the Wildcats' ensuing possession, converting a layup and the and-one free throw to cut the UNO lead to 84-82 with 12 seconds to play.
ACU fouled Frye intentionally on the inbounds play, and after hitting the first free throw, he missed the second and Austin Cooke picked up the defensive rebound, giving the Wildcats a chance to tie or win the game in regulation.
They did both.
After a timeout, Franklin took the inbounds pass and sprinted up the floor, moving easily through the entire UNO defense for the game-tying layup with 5.8 seconds to play. After a brief officials' review to re-set the game clock, ACU had a chance to set its defense, and that resulted in the play of the season for the Wildcats.
Frye got the inbounds pass and sped to halfcourt where he was met by Franklin, who swiped the ball out of his hands. Despite being swarmed by a possee of Privateers, Franklin got the ball out of his hands to his left where Lewis was waiting without a single UNO defender in front of him. He caught the ball, launched it and watched it bank in just as the buzzer sounded to end the game.
Then, pandemonium from the bench, the scorer's table, and the assembled crowd, which had swollen to almost 2,000 in the second half as fans began to trickle in for the UIL girls' basketball regional championship game between Eula and Roby.
"I saw their guard (Frye) get past a couple of defenders and I thought I would step in and meet him at halfcourt," Franklin said. "The ball just popped right up in front of my face and I grabbed it. I kind of saw Jaren out of the corner of my eye and got it to him."
"When I saw J-Frank make the steal, I thought I should get toward halfcourt and see if there was anything I could to help him," said Lewis. "He kind of got into a mess and then when I got the ball, my first reaction was to catch and shoot because I knew we didn't have much time left in the game. I was hoping it was going to go in."
It did, it kept ACU's Southland Conference record at Moody Co-liseum perfect this season at 6-0 and pushed the Wildcats to 13-16 overall and 8-8 in the league. The Wildcats - who trailed by as many as eight points late in the first half and six points in the second half - have doubled their conference win total for the second straight season, from two in 2013-14 to four in 2014-15 to eight in 2015-16 with two home games left on the schedule.
"There's a fine line between winning and losing, and that was on display (Saturday)," Golding said. "To be able to turn a program around, you have to win some recruiting battles, and we've won a lot of those in the last year. Then you have to start winning at home, and we've started doing that this year. The next step is to learn to win on the road, and we're still going through that process. But this was a special night and a special win and a huge step in our building process. Sometimes you need a win like that one to springboard you to even greater success. "
Franklin led four players in double figures with those 28 points, while Lewis finished with 13 points and seniors Jalen Little and Parker Wentz with 15 and 10 points, respectively.
Little was huge, scoring those 15 points to go along with two rebounds, five assists and one steal in 33 minutes, while Wentz overcame getting run over on a charge call early in the second half to score those 10 points and get two rebounds and two steals in 30 minutes.
"Our guys didn't quit (Saturday night) and they found a way to win," Golding said. "We're going to change this program by getting talented winners in here, and that's exactly how we won this one."
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