JONESBORO, Ark.?Dereke Tipler's basket with .2 seconds remaining in overtime gave Arkansas State an 85-84 win over Florida International here on Saturday, and in the process kept Indian hopes alive for a high seed in the Sun Belt Conference Tournament.
“It was really a good, good college basketball game that lasted way longer than I wanted it to,” said ASU head coach Dickey Nutt. “But I was really proud of our team to execute, because I thought at South Alabama.....we didn't execute. We let them take them out of our offense. Tonight, we didn't let that happen.”
Tipler, like the Indians (11-14, 6-5 SBC), overcame sluggish starts in both halves and overtime to eke out the win over a surging FIU (6-16, 3-7 SBC) team. But as seems to be the case in most games, Tipler came through when his team needed him most.
“He (Tipler) has that something that is hard to coach, and that is heart,” said Nutt. “You don't bring a guy in here and try to coach-up his heart. That is in place before he gets here. When the game is on the line he'd rather shoot the free throw or take the last shot. He really put us on his shoulders.”
ASU trailed by a point at 84-83 with 14 seconds remaining in overtime. Tipler brought the ball down and set up the offense. The ball worked around the perimeter before ending up in Marus Ardison's hands before he was double-teamed.
Ardison dribbled left and stepped back to find Tipler cutting toward the basket with his defender trailing the play. Ardison's pass hit Tipler in the hands, where he stepped left and jumped up to take the shot with three defenders on him. The basket counted to give him 14 points on the night, none bigger than the last-second shot.
While the game was a nail-biter, Nutt was pleased overall with his team's performance.
“I couldn't be more proud of our team,” said Nutt. “But we didn't play as well as we wanted to and Florida International had a lot to do with that. Their defense was outstanding tonight.”
Ardison led all ASU players with 18 points to go with 10 rebounds. Yual Banks scored 16, Isaac Wells had 12 and Jim Jones scored 10 to pace the Indians. FIU was paced by the preseason All-SBC performer Ivan Almonte and his 20 points and 18 rebounds. Facundo Giorgi added 16 off the bench, Chris Fuller scored 13, Johwen Villegas scored 11 and Kenny Simms scored 10 points.
ASU began both halves and the overtime sluggish. FIU scored the first four points in overtime before ASU battled back. The Golden Panthers started the second half on a 17-12 run and began the first half going ahead 14-2 in the first six minutes.
“I thought in the second half we had some let-downs,” said Nutt. “I thought defensively, we ended up just jogging down the floor. We've got to go back to the film room because the film doesn't lie.”
Free throws nearly cost the Indians in the game, too, according to Nutt. The Indians hit just 8-of-18 from the free throw line in the first half and 27-of-44 for the game.
ASU's next game is a home contest Feb. 16 against the Blue Raiders of Middle Tennessee.
