USIU Falls Again on Shot at Buzzer : Basketball: Northeastern Illinois (2-16) wins, 100-108.
There was a time this season when U.S. International’s men’s basketball team was praying for the rest of the season. Now they might be praying for the season to be put to rest.
For the second game in a row, USIU blew a lead and was beaten by a last-second shot.
Northeastern Illinois guard Greg Houston hit a short but awkward one-handed jump shot at the buzzer to beat the Gulls, 110-108, and stun 421 fans at Golden Hall. Only two nights earlier, USIU lost, 105-103, to Cal State Los Angeles on a three-point shot with three seconds left.
Northeastern Illinois improved to 2-16. Both of its victories have come against USIU. The Gulls dropped to 1-20 and lost their 16th game in a row.
Yet it was only a month ago that Coach Gary Zarecky and his team celebrated the fact they could finish their season after USIU’s trustees voted to eliminate athletics. The Gulls have had nothing to celebrate since.
“It’s eerie,” Zarecky said of his team’s fortunes. “It’s down right phenomenal. We’re not playing with heart or any degree of intelligence.”
Again, the Gulls wasted strong performances by guard Kevin Bradshaw and 6-foot-4 forward Isaac Brown. Bradshaw, the nation’s leading scorer, finished with 46 points on 19-for-35 shooting from the field. Brown, a sophomore from Queens, N.Y., had 20 points and 17 rebounds.
Brown sprained his right ankle in the middle of a 26-point, 18-rebound performance against CSLA Thursday, and he was advised not to play Saturday. But he took off the soft cast before the game and played anyway. He played well. But he was not in a good mood after this teammates let a low-scoring guard get free and beat them for the second game in a row .
“Gutless,” Brown said of his team’s effort. “It’s a loser attitude. They (the Eagles) had the winner attitude.”
Northeastern Illinois appeared to have run out of time after it inbounded the ball with 17 seconds left and couldn’t find an open shot. Then Houston, a 6-foot-3 sophomore, broke toward the basket from the right side of the baseline, and freshman guard Kevin Flegner (34 points) gave him a wrap-around bounce pass. Houston grabbed the pass and tossed in a five-foot rainbow left-handed.
As the ball sailed through the net the game clock went 0:00.
“I looked up at the clock and said, ‘Oh, no. I just want to know how come we can’t have the ball with 17 seconds left,’ ” Brown said.
“I don’t know what to say. We can’t play zone. We can’t play man-to-man. What else is there? I just want to rewind the tape and find out whose man it was.”
Zarecky suggested the officials had a hand in the defeat when they whistled Bradshaw for a foul after he appeared to partially block a three-point attempt by Houston. With the score tied, 106-106, with 38 seconds left, Houston made two of three free throws.
“You go on the road and get unbelievably bad officiating, and you come home and get that,” Zarecky said. “That didn’t cost us the game, but it’s part of our overall situation. In the last 50 seconds of a game, that call (normally) goes the home team’s way.”