VANCOUVER - A big second half comeback by the UBC Thunderbirds was spoiled in the dying seconds of the game on Saturday night, as the Saskatchewan Huskies' Jamelle Barrett scored eight points in the final 1:11 of the fourth to give his side a 97-96 win at War Memorial Gym.
After
Josh Whyte missed both free throws with nine seconds remaining and the 'Birds up 96-95, a lengthy scramble for the rebound saw several players get a touch on the ball until Rejean Chabot finally wrestled it away from the crowd and drew a foul from Whyte with less than four seconds left.
Chabot then hit both his free throws to put the Huskies up 97-96, and a last-second layup attempt in heavy traffic by UBC's
Melvyn Mayott bounced harmlessly off the rim to give Saskatchewan the win.
After being down as many as 19 points early in the second half, the T-Birds stormed back to take the lead and were up eight points midway through the fourth. But Barrett scored 15 of his game-high 34 points in the final frame, and eight in the final 1:11 to get Saskatchewan back in it. He was 5-for-8 from beyond the arc in the game and a perfect 11-for-11 from the free throw line.
As good as Barrett was in the second half, Duncan Jones may have been even better in the first. He scored 17 first quarter points and was 7-for-8 from the field at halftime, including a 4-for-4 mark from three-point range. The T-Birds held him in check in the second half and he finished with 22 points, but Barrett and Chabot picked up where he left off to carry the Huskies to victory. Chabot finished with 19 points.
Whyte led the T-Birds with 23 points and six assists while chipping in eight rebounds.
Brent Malish had a game-high 11 rebounds and was a force in the fourth quarter, scoring 11 of his 18 points on 5-of-6 shooting in the final frame.
Balraj Bains sparked the UBC comeback in the third quarter with two huge plays back-to-back. Early in his team's 11-0 run that saw them take their first lead of the game, he came up with a big block on Jones, and then had a put-back dunk off a
Tommy Nixon miss at the other end of the floor which made the score 65-64 Huskies. His night was cut short with 4:27 left in the fourth when he picked up his fifth foul.
The T-Bird bench outscored the Huskies' backups 34-4 in the game, with
Nathan Yu scoring 13, Nixon chipping in 10, and
Doug Plumb and Mayott each scoring nine points.
Next week the T-Birds will be at Trinity Western to take on the Spartans, arguably their biggest rivals in the conference. They will meet on October 29 and 30 in Langley, at 8 and 7 p.m. respectively. The Huskies head back to Saskatchewan for their home opener against Victoria next week.
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