Virginia Scrambles ACC Race With Upset

Virginia’s 62-55 upset win over Georgia Tech Saturday at Charlottesville, Va., sent the Atlantic Coast Conference into a five-team scramble for first place.

The loss trimmed the Yellow Jackets’ lead to a half-game in a race with North Carolina, North Carolina State, Maryland and Duke. All five teams have four conference losses.

The Cavaliers built a 13-point halftime lead and that advantage was never seriously challenged by the Yellow Jackets.

“We did an excellent job on defense, particularly in the first half,” Virginia Coach Terry Holland said. “And we shot 60% from the field. Those factors enabled us to get control of the game and we never really gave up that control.”

Sophomore guard Tom Calloway scored a season-high 16 points for Virginia (14-11, 2-8). Georgia Tech, which had won eight of its last nine games, fell to 18-5, 7-4.

Calloway, a transfer from Old Dominion who moved into the Cavaliers’ starting lineup eight games ago, harassed Georgia Tech’s Mark Price and held him to 17 points, nine of which came in the final 4:14 with Virginia in control. Price was only 5 of 14 from the field.

Olden Polynice scored 14 points for Virginia and Tom Sheehey had 13. Sheehey hit six of the Cavaliers’ first seven shots from the floor.

Georgia Tech scored six straight points to open the second half and closed within seven, 32-25, but that was as close the Yellow Jackets could get until a pair of free throws by Price with 42 seconds left trimmed the deficit to six, 59-53.

The Yellow Jackets went into the game as the ACC’s top field-goal shooting team, but they shot only 35.5% (20-58). Georgia Tech is 0-7 at Virginia’s University Hall.

The victory was Holland’s 320th of his 16-year coaching career.

N. Carolina St. 85, N. Carolina 76--The Wolfpack snapped the Tar Heels’ five-game winning streak with the effective inside-outside scoring combination of 6-11 Cozell McQueen and 5-7 Anthony (Spud) Webb in an ACC game at Raleigh, N.C.

McQueen and Webb each scored 20 points to lead North Carolina State, which outscored North Carolina, 15-6, in the last 3:57 to break open the game.

Lorenzo Charles added 14 points for the Wolfpack, 16-7 and 6-4 in the ACC. The Tar Heels, who were led by Brad Daugherty’s 20 points, are 19-6, 6-4.

Memphis St. 70, Florida St. 68--Junior point guard Andre Turner stole an inbounds pass and hit a 25-foot jump shot with one second left to give the Tigers a Metro Conference win at Memphis, Tenn.

Memphis State, trailing, 47-32, at halftime, came back behind the play-making of the 5-10 Turner, who scored 18 points.

Senior forward Keith Lee, who was in foul trouble for most of the second half, added 16 for Memphis State, 19-2 overall and 8-1 in league play.

The Seminoles were led by Randy Allen, who scored 31 points, 27 in the second half. Florida State is 10-12, 2-8.

Georgetown 87, Providence 73--Leading 15-14 after six minutes, the Hoyas scored 14 unanswered points and went on to hand the Friars their seventh straight loss. The win was the Hoyas’ fifth in a row.

Reggie Williams scored a game-high 20 points for Georgetown, 23-2, 10-2 in Big East Play. Providence is 9-17, 2-11.

Mississippi St. 82, Kentucky 69--The win put the Bulldogs in a four-way tie for the Southeastern Conference lead with the Wildcats, LSU and Georgia--all with 9-5 conference records.

Mississippi State, undefeated in seven conference games at home this season was led by Ken Harvey’s 18 points. Tracy Taylor added 16 and Ervin Dillion had 14.

Kenny Walker, the SEC’s leading scorer, had 27 for Kentucky.

Iowa State 72, Kansas 70--Jeff Hornacek’s layup with eight seconds to go at Ames, Iowa, gave the Cyclones the Big Eight win.

Iowa State led for most of the second half until Kansas’ Ron Kellogg scored with 56 seconds left to tie the score at 70.

Barry Stevens, a 6-5 senior, scored 22 points for Iowa State (17-9, 5-5) to become only the third 2,000-point scorer in Big Eight history.

Kansas (20-6, 7-3) was led by freshman Danny Manning, who scored 19 points. The Jayhawks shot 80% from the field in the second half (16-20).

Oklahoma 88, Missouri 84--The Tigers, looking for their second major upset in less than a week, came up short at Columbia, Mo., as Wayman Tisdale led the Sooners to their 23rd straight Big Eight regular-season win.

Missouri, which beat Kansas last Tuesday night, 62-55, erased a 54-47 halftime deficit behind the shooting of forward Malcolm Thomas, who scored a game-high 33 points.

The Sooners broke an 80-80 tie on a basket by Darryl Kennedy and were never headed.

Tisdale scored 23 to lead Oklahoma, 21-5, 10-0. Missouri is 15-10, 5-5.

Duke 81, Notre Dame 67--David Henderson came off the bench to score 18 points as the Blue Devils easily won a nonconference game at East Rutherford, N.J.

Notre Dame fell to 14-7 despite a 27-point performance by Ken Barlow. Duke raised its record to 19-4.

Syracuse 76, Louisiana State 64--In the first-ever meeting between the two teams, the Orangeman opened up a big first-half lead but had to rally midway through the second half to record their fourth straight win at Syracuse.

Nikita Wilson paced the Tigers (15-8) with 17 points. Rafael Addison scored 25 and Pearl Washington added 20 for Syracuse (19-4).

Michigan 66, Minnesota 64--Butch Wade’s layup with 16 seconds left gave the Wolverines the win in a Big Ten game at Minneapolis.

Roy Tarpley paced the league-leading Wolverines (20-3, 11-2) with 21 points and 15 rebounds. The Gophers, led by Tommy Davis’ 17 points, fell to 12-10, 5-7.

SMU 72, Louisville 64--The Mustangs, led by Larry Davis, muffled a Cardinals’ rally to pick up their 20th victory in a nonconference game at Dallas.

SMU saw a 12-point lead shrink to two in the final minutes, but scored two baskets and two free throws as the Mustangs improved their record to 20-4. Louisville is 12-12.

Northeastern 76, Ohio State 74--In an embarrassing defeat for the Buckeyes at East Rutherford, N.J., Reggie Lewis scored 29 points and Andre LaFleur hit a 15-foot jumper with two seconds to go as Northeastern improved its record to 14-8. Ohio State is 15-7.

Texas A&M; 67, TCU 60--Kenny Brown scored 18 in the win at College Station, Tex., that left the Aggies tied with Texas Tech at 8-4 in the Southwest Conference--one game behind league-leading SMU.

Boston College 62, Villanova 61--The Eagles came from 11 points back in the final 10 minutes to upset the Wildcats in a Big East contest at Newton, Mass.

Roger McCready led Boston College (18-6, 7-6) with 22 points. Villanova is 15-8, 7-6.

Louisiana Tech 59, McNeese St. 58--Karl Malone’s tip-in with one second left game gave Tech the Southland Conference win at Ruston, La.

Robert Godbolt led Louisiana Tech (22-2, 8-1) with 19 points. Joe Dumars’ 22 points paced McNeese State (14-9, 6-3).

San Diego State 99, New Mexico 80--The win at San Diego enabled the Aztecs to retain a share of first place in the WAC with Texas El Paso, which played at Hawaii Saturday night.