Nijel Pack scored 20 points, hitting a pair of 3-pointers in overtime, to help lift Oklahoma to a 90-86 win over Colorado in the opening round of the College Basketball Crown on Wednesday in Las Vegas.
The Sooners (20-15) will play the Baylor-Minnesota winner in Saturday’s semifinals.
Oklahoma’s last eight points came from the free-throw line.
The Sooners took the lead on Xzayvier Brown’s free throws with 32 seconds remaining. Colorado’s Ian Inman misfired on a jumper with four seconds remaining. Kuol Atak snared the rebounds, drew a foul and converted two free throws on the other end to put Oklahoma up three with 3.9 seconds remaining.
Barrington Hargress went to the free-throw line for Colorado after a foul, but missed the first to put the Buffs in an even more difficult position. He tried to miss the second, but it went in, and then Brown hit two free throws to put the game away.
Hargress had been 14-of-14 from the free-throw line before the miss.
Hargress scored a season-high 31 points for the Buffaloes (17-16). Alon Michaeli added 18.
Despite shooting just 24% from the floor in the second half, Colorado trailed by just two in the closing seconds after Josiah Sanders grabbed the rebound on Atak’s missed 3-pointer to give the Buffs the ball with 19.9 seconds remaining after a timeout.
Hargress dribbled the clock down, continually looking for an opening until he had no choice but to drive. Hargress hit the layup to tie the game with 1.6 seconds left.
Tae Davis caught an inbounds heave and got up a turnaround 3-pointer at the buzzer but his attempt hit off the backboard to send the game to overtime.
Davis scored 19, Brown added 17 and Atak tallied 16 in the Oklahoma victory.
Despite a short-handed lineup without three of its top four scorers from the regular season, the Buffaloes led most of the way.
The Sooners started just 1-of-11 from the floor, missing seven 3-pointers.
Colorado hit six consecutive shots late in the first half, stretching its lead to 41-31 on Felix Kossaras’ (14 points) jumper with 74 seconds remaining.
Oklahoma quickly closed the gap going into halftime, though, on back-to-back 3-pointers from Atak and Brown to cut the Buffs’ lead to four at the break.
The teams combined to convert 61 of 71 free throw attempts. Colorado was 33-of-39 (84.6%), while Oklahoma swished 28-of-32 (87.5%).
–Field Level Media
