The home-court advantage, a sellout crowd for the last home game of the regular season and an aggressive 2-3 zone defense brought Illinois-Chicago to the brink of an upset Wednesday night at the expense of eighth-ranked Butler.
Three-point shots made the difference: the Bulldogs relied on them, while UIC missed repeatedly.
Butler’s A.J. Graves hit a tie-breaking three-pointer with 45 seconds to play and, with three seconds remaining, the Flames’ Josh Mayo missed a three-pointer that would have sent the game into overtime. Thus, the Bulldogs were able to escape from the Pavilion with a 51-46 win.
After Mayo’s unsuccessful attempt to tie the score 49-49, Graves was fouled and made two free throws, giving him a team-high 14 points and sealing the victory that assured No. 8 Butler (25-2, 14-2) of no worse than a tie for the Horizon League regular-season title.
“We were hyped for it and there was a lot of excitement,” Mayo said. “We just didn’t finish.”
Poor shooting was a constant for the Flames (14-13, 8-8). They wound up missing 12 of 14 three-pointers and in the first half they had a 9-minute-40-second stretch during which they failed to score on 13 straight possessions.
Despite the severe scoring drought, the Flames only trailed by five points at the half.
The Flames played their best basketball early in the second half and surged to a 33-28 lead.
Jermaine Dailey began the breakthrough with a dunk, 7-foot Scott VanderMeer made three baskets from short range and Mayo penetrated for a tip-in basket before sinking UIC’s only two three-pointers.
Butler quickly counterattacked.
“Zach [Hahn] came in and made a couple of big threes and made a nice pass to Pete [Campbell] for a third one,” Butler coach Brad Stevens said in summarizing the rally. They stayed in that zone the entire night, even when we hit a couple. It was a great risk and it almost worked. The threes were all that was available.
“If you don’t make shots you have to guard to stay in the game and that’s what we did.”
The Bulldogs were 13 of 37 from three-point territory. They attempted only 10 conventional field goals and made five. They had only three free-throw opportunities, a miss by Mike Green on a one-and-one with 11 seconds to go and the two by Graves with a second left.
“It was a good game but no cigar,” UIC coach Jimmy Collins said.
“You’re not going to win when you shoot 33 percent at home and two of your seniors (Robert Bush and Karl White Jr.) are 1-for-12.”
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nmilbert@tribune.com
