POSTGAME INTERVIEW WITH HEAD COACH JOE GOLDING
LAS VEGAS – Rollins College outscored ACU by 12 points in the final 10 minutes of the game Saturday afternoon as the Tars knocked off the Wildcats, 65-61, in the Las Vegas Desert Classic at the Dolittle Center.
The Wildcats are now 4-5 on the season and will take on high-scoring Florida Tech at 4:30 p.m. Sunday. The game can be heard on KSLI 1280 AM locally. The Wildcats have lost four straight games since a 59-58 win at West Texas A&M on Nov. 28 with three of the four losses coming by four points or less, including Saturday's.
ACU led Saturday's contest 51-43 with 10:32 after Eric lawton drilled a jumper to put his team up eight points. But Kyle McClanahan returned the favor with a jumper of his own at the 10:02 mark to cut ACU's lead back to 51-45.
That started a 22-10 Rollins run to end the game and propel the Tars to the victory. Adam Allen hit a 3-pointer at the 9:20 mark to make it 51-48 before Brett Chance hit a layup to cut the lead to 51-50 with 8:20 left. Lawton hit another 3-pointer to make it 54-50 with 7:50 left before Rollins went on a 9-1 run to grab a 59-55 lead with 5:40 to play. Rollins would not trail the rest of the way.
ACU trailed 61-60 with 1:10 to play after a three-point play by Lawton and then had the ball with less than 20 seconds to play. But
Elliott Lloyd had the ball stripped and taken away by Dave Diakite with nine seconds left and McClanahan hit two free throws with eight seconds to play to make it 63-60.
Lawton hit 1 of 2 free throws with four seconds left to make it 63-61, but Chris Uhle ended it with two free throws with two seconds to make it 65-61 to finish it off.
Lawton led the Wildcats with 25 points on 8 of 10 shooting from the floor (4 of 6 from 3-point range), while
Steven Werner had 18 points on 8 of 15 shooting from the floor.
