Trojans come up a bit short in Sun Belt title game

HOT SPRINGS, Ark. — The smallest player on the court made the shot of the season for North Texas and the shot that broke the hearts of Troy.

Josh White, generously listed at 5-foot-10, hit a floater with 22 seconds left to break the tie, then hit the front end of a one-and-one with 2.9 seconds left, giving North Texas a 66-63 win over Troy in the Sun Belt Tournament championship game.

North Texas now takes the league’s automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament. Troy, which was seeded first thanks to winning a three-way regular season tiebreaker over Middle Tennessee and UNT, will go to the National InvitationTournament.

White broke a 63-all tie with his floater from just inside the free throw line. Troy’s Brandon Hazzard got his shot blocked by UNT’s George Odufuwa with seven seconds left.

The ball went out of bounds off Troy to UNT, which was able to throw a deep pass inbounds to White, burning four seconds before he went to the free throw line.

He made the front end of the one-and-one, but missed the second. Troy rebounded and Mike Vogler’s shot from halfcourt was well off. Troy dropped to 20-12 while UNT won its 11th straight to improve to 23-8.

With 5:06 left, UNT’s Eric Tramiel, the tournament’s most outstanding player, scored down low to put UNT up 61-54.

A steal led to a dunk by Yamene Coleman with 4:12 left. Hazzard hit a three at the 3:35 mark and Coleman tied it at 61 with a hook shot with 2:34 left. Tramiel then got his own rebound and scored, and Troy missed a shot, but got a steal in the backcourt with just under a minute.

Vogler got the steal and found Hazzard, but he was fouled and unable to hit the lay-up, but did hit two free throws to tie the game before White’s heroics.

Hazzard, Troy’s first-team all-conference player the last two years, took his last shot — a floater about 10 feet from the basket into the teeth of UNT’s big forwards — but it was blocked with seven seconds left.

“I was hoping to try to jump into their bodies and get some type of foul,” Hazzard said. “It was contact, but I guess the refs didn’t feel like it was enough.”

White struggled from the field, hitting just 3-of-11 shots, but hit a huge 3-pointer with 6:35 left to put UNT up 59-51.

That was before Troy turned it up and, despite shooting just 28.6 percent in the second half, made its run.

“We’ve had success in close games this year,” Maestri said. “When you have that success, you don’t ever stop believing that you can get back in it.”

The game was back and forth throughout, changing leads 15 times. Troy led 40-38 at the half, but struggled again in the second half as North Texas switched to a 2-3 zone defense. Troy scored just 23 points in the second half.

“They have a tremendous basketball team,” UNT head coach Johnny Jones said. “We had to make the adjustment because they were scoring at will. They turned into a straight jump-shooting team and it was the turning point because it allowed us to get stops and put the pressure on their outside shots.”
Troy also couldn’t contain UNT forwards Tramiel (20 points, 10 rebounds) and Odufuwa (11 points, 17 rebounds), as the Mean Green enjoyed a 42-28 advantage on the boards over the smaller Trojans.

“From the beginning of the game to the end, they controlled the boards,” Maestri said. “They dominated the boards.”

Troy’s Vogler and Hazzard made the all-tournament team along with UNT’s Tramiel and Odufuwa and Denver’s Nate Rohnert and Western Kentucky’s A.J. Slaughter.

Hazzard, who nearly tripled his scoring average from his sophomore season to his last two years, didn’t have a clear answer for what turned the tide.
“You really never can tell,” Hazzard said. “Things happen for a reason. We came out and just didn’t hit as many shots as we should have. It wasn’t really our night.”

Troy will find out its destination in the NIT on Sunday.