OXFORD, Ohio – Miami’s Dion Wade went 1-of-2 from the free throw line with just over a second remaining on Tuesday night, breaking a 74-74 tie and leading Miami to a 75-74 win over the University at Buffalo men’s basketball team. The loss snaps a two-game winning streak for the Bulls as they fall to 9-11 on the season and 3-4 in league play.
Early on, it seemed as if the Bulls were in good shape as Buffalo raced out to a 28-13 lead just nine and a half minutes into the game. Sophomore Nikola Rakicevic was solid early on as he had five of the first seven points for the Bulls. A three-point play from senior Willie Conner with 10:37 left put the Bulls ahead by 15. UB took its largest lead of the half with 8:42 left on a free throw by Blake Hamilton, giving the Bulls a 21-15 lead.
UB continued to lead by 14 with 3:24 remaining when Miami scored seven straight points and the Bulls went on to take a 39-31 lead into the break.
Miami cut the Buffalo lead to two with 14:33 left in the second half when UB went on a 9-0 run as a three pointer from Nick Perkins gave the Bulls a 54-43 lead with 11:46 remaining. Buffalo led by five with 5:25 left when Miami went on a 7-0 run as the RedHawks took their first lead since the first half with just 3:25 remaining.
The RedHawks took their largest lead of the game at four with just a minute left when sophomore CJ Massinburg was fouled on a three-pointer, converting the four-point play and tying the game up. The RedHawks went back ahead by two, but a layup from Perkins with 31 seconds left tied the game up at 74-74. On Miami’s final possession the RedHawks missed a layup with five seconds left, but secured an offensive rebound and Wade was fouled with just over a second left.
Wade went to the free throw line and hit the first free throw, which was his only point of the night. He missed the second and UB secured the rebound, calling timeout with a second left. The Bulls were unable to get a final shot off before the buzzer.
Perkins led all scorers with 20 points, 15 of those coming in the second half. He just missed out on the double-double as he had nine rebounds. Massinburg and Conner each finished with 16 points. Conner added six rebounds on the night, while Massinburg had a team-high four assists.
Hamilton, UB’s leading scorer, was held to just five points before fouling out. Rakicevic and Dontay Caruthers each finished with five points. Senior David Kadiri had four points and a team-high 10 rebounds.
As a team, UB had eight steals on the night, but seven of those came in the first half. The Bulls were also hurt by turnovers as they had just one over the first 12 minutes of the game, but then had 14 over the final 28 minutes of action.
Miami was led by 18 points from Marcus Weathers and 16 points from his brother Michael Weathers.
The Bulls will remain on the road as they travel to Akron on Saturday night to play the league-leading Zips. Tipoff is scheduled for 7:30pm. Akron enters Saturday’s game undefeated in conference play and riding the nation’s third longest home winning streak.
from UBBulls.com via IFTTT
