The North Texas Mean Green Eagles came back from a 13-point deficit to take down the Rice Owls 63-62 in the first round of the Conference USA Men’s basketball championship.
Trailing by nine at the half, North Texas came back and outscored Rice 20-9 in the first nine minutes in the second half and eventually sent the game to overtime as sophomore guard Keith Washington missed the game-winning jumper with only four seconds remaining.
It all came down to the last minute of overtime when the Owls’ junior forward Seth Gearhart and senior guard Austin Ramljak missed their two shots from the free throw line and North Texas’ junior guard Chris Jones made both at the other end to give the Mean Green Eagles a 63-62 lead with 20 seconds left in the game.
Freshman guard Marcus Jackson missed the game-winning jumper and North Texas held on to a 63-62 victory. For the Mean Green Eagles senior guard Brendan Walton led the way with 17 points, followed by junior forward Colin Voss with 16. Junior guard Jordan Williams had a double-double with 11 point and 14 rebounds.
Ramljak led the Owls in scoring with 17 points and forwards Sean Obi and Seth Gearhart followed with 12 and respectively.
With the win No. 10 North Texas advanced to the second round where they will face the No. 7 seed the Tulane Green Wave tomorrow at 12 p.m., at the Don Haskins Center. Edwin Delgado may be reached at [email protected].
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