Uzoh, McDade Lead TU Past SMU 72-60

This time around it didn't come down to a last second shot.  Ben Uzoh and Brett McDade each scored 18 points to lead TU to a 72-60 win on Saturday over SMU.  Uzoh scored 13 points in the first half to boost Tulsa (10-9, 2-5 Conference USA) to a 41-27 halftime lead and Tulsa led SMU (7-12, 1-5) by as many as 21 points in the second half and weathered a rally by the Mustangs.

It was McDade, along with Rod Earls, Uzoh and Ray Reese, who had the duty of guarding the reigning conference player of the week, SMU's Jon Killen. Killen, who entered the game averaging 18.2 points in conference play, rarely got any good looks in the first half, scoring only four points.

But Killen caught fire in the second half, leading the SMU's rally from a 54-33 deficit with a little more than 12 minutes remaining to within 58-50 with just under eight minutes left.

McDade stopped the bleeding by Tulsa with a 3-pointer with 7:51 left, making it 61-50, and the Golden Hurricane held a double-digit lead for the rest of the game. SMU couldn't recover after Killen fouled out with 13 points with 5:40 left and Tulsa leading 64-53.

"Our game plan was to attack Killen and attack the Mustangs,'' said McDade.  "I think we did a great job of wearing him down tonight.''

The Golden Hurricane was coming off an overtime loss at Marshall, the Golden Hurricane's third overtime loss in their six previous conference games. TU's only previous conference win was also against SMU, a 72-71 victory on January 19th in which McDade hit a last second shot to win the game.

Alex Malone led the Mustangs with 14 points.