As time expired on Saturday night, sophomore forward Jermyl Jackson-Wilson tipped in a 2-pointer to push the CU Men’s Basketball team past Northern Colorado, 88-86.
“I think the team with the most potential won. I don’t know if I believe that the best team won,” Head Coach Ricardo Patton said. “I think we won by the grace of God, I really do.”
With a few seconds left in the game, junior guard Richard Roby drove with the ball but missed his jump shot.
“We wanted to get the ball in the post and hopefully draw a foul, but they did a good job of denying the post. So I had it at the top of the key, I penetrated and kicked to Dominique. He kicked it back. I was going to look to shoot, but he closed on me,” Roby said.
Senior guard Dominique Coleman tipped the basketball and missed, but Jackson-Wilson tipped the ball in with no time remaining.
“I didn’t know how much time was left; I knew we had to get it off really fast. The tap from Dominique and the combination of the drive by Rich left me wide open,” Jackson-Wilson said.
The Buffs allowed four 3-pointers in the last five minutes of the game. The Bears went on a 16-10 run to tie the score at 86.
“When you play as hard as they play and when you play as fearless as they play, then you are going to be able to make plays like that,” Patton said.
In the first half, the Buffs went on a scoring drought for five minutes. It didn’t end until Roby dropped a two pointer, which tied the score at 10.
Freshman guard Kal Bay was three of four from 3-point range in the first half. He had 9 points in the first half, while Roby led the team in points with 12.
The Buffs maintained the lead for the majority of the second half until the Bears drained a 3-pointer to tie the game. The Buffs shot a dismal 37 percent from the field in the second half and 38.8 percent for the game.
Roby and Coleman led all players with 21 points each. Roby was only six of 19 from the field and made nine of 14 free throws.
Despite the poor play in the second half, the Buffs managed to snap a two game losing streak. The team improves their record to 3-4.
