Arizona men’s basketball locks down on defense in 2nd half to win at BYU, remain tied for 1st in Big 12

It counts the same as the previous nine wins, but Arizona may have just had its most impressive performance of Big 12 play.

The 20th-ranked Wildcats outscored BYU by 10 points over the final 7-plus minutes, turning a 1-point game in front of a hostile crowd into a runaway 85-74 victory on Tuesday night. A crowd of 17,274 at the Marriott Center unleashed a few ‘U of A!’ chants in the second half, during which Arizona held the Cougars to 3 of 16 from 3 after making seven triples in the first half.

Arizona (16-6, 10-1 Big 12) remained in a tie for first place with its fifth straight victory, improving to 5-1 on the road in league play. It shot 49.2 percent, went 15 of 17 from the line and outrebounded the Cougars (15-7, 6-5) by 15.

Caleb Love had 18 points, becoming the 57^th player in UA history with 1,000 points while also joining an exclusive Division I club, while Jaden Bradley and Henri Veesaar had 17 and Tobe Awaka 14 with nine rebounds. All 17 of Bradley’s points came in the second half, including 13 after he picked up his third foul with 13:29 left but didn’t come out until the final minute.

It was a physical game, but not one with a lot of fouls, only 10 called in the first 20 minutes. Tied at 41 at the half, the physicality that hadn’t led to many calls resulted in two Arizona players getting knocked to the ground in the first 90 seconds of the second half. Trey Townsend smacked his head on the floor and then Awaka was slapped in the face, with both having to come out.

Their absence caused Arizona to go small, and BYU responded by getting to the rim multiple times. But the Wildcats matched that early offense, using a 9-0 run to lead 56-50. In that run was a layup by Love to put him over 1,000 for his UA career, and in doing so became the 12^th player in Division I history to get to 1,000 at multiple schools.

Awaka returned with just over 12 minutes left and scored on a putback for a 60-56 edge but BYU scored five in a row to go back in front, a lead that was short lived after Love hit his fourth triple. That sparked a 7-0 run for a 67-61 edge with under 10 minutes to go.

The Cougars pulled within 67-66 on a Dallin Hall layup with 7:47 left but then went scoreless for more than three minutes, during which time Arizona scored nine in a row to built a 10-point lead. The Cougars went more than six minutes without a field goal, missing eight straight shots, before hitting a two garbage baskets in the final minute.

Arizona didn’t play into BYU’s defensive gameplan at the outset, taking nine of its first 12 shots from inside the 3-point line. That prompted the Cougars to switch to a 2-3 zone and force more from the outside, but the Wildcats kept trying to get into the paint, with midrange jumpers by KJ Lewis and Awaka putting them up 24-23 with 10:28 left in the first half.

Along the way the UA had a 10-0 run that immediately followed BYU getting a gift from the officials. A moving screen on the the Cougars was reversed on replay, with Bradley instead getting called for a flagrant 1 foul due to his elbow grazing BYU’s Trevin Knell on the neck.

BYU hit five of its first 11 3-pointers but then started to drive, with Egor Demin leading the way. His miss on a reverse teed it up for Keba Keita to slam home the putback for a 29-28 lead, and Demin led the Cougars with 16 points but was 7 of 20 from the field and had four of their 10 turnovers.

Love went on a personal late run, hitting a pair of 3s to tie it at 39, then his lob to Veesaar led to a tying dunk with four seconds left in the first half.

Arizona returns home for a revenge game on Saturday night, hosting No. 13 Texas Tech. The Red Raiders (18-4, 9-2) have won seven in a row.