KENT, OHIO – Senior Phillip Whittington made a put-back of a missed shot with 20.7 seconds remaining to give the Kent State Golden Flashes a 68-67 win over arch-rival Akron Friday night before a sellout crowd of 6,339 at the MAC Center.
Kent State (16-6, 6-3 MAC) picked up . . .
“It was a typical, Kent-Akron game.” KSU head coach Rob Senderoff said. “Great effort by the entire roster tonight and a great play at the end by Phil.”
Junior Danny Pippen led all scorers in the contest with 20 points and 12 rebounds. It was his fifth double-double of the KSU.
Along with Pippen, three others KSU players reached double figures. Fellow senior Antonio Williams had 17 with five boards and three assists. Whittington and Troy Simons each added 11.
Akron (16-6, 6-3 MAC) suffered consecutive losses for the first time this season. In addition, it was the second consecutive game in which the Zips lost on the final possession. On Tuesday night, UA fell to Buffalo 77-74 when the Bulls connected on a three-pointer with 6.1 seconds remaining.
They made the big plays at the end.” Zips head coach John Groce said. “However, we need to get a lot better.”
Junior Loren christen Jackson led UA with 19 points. Senior Zeyrius Williams registered his ninth double-double of the campaign with 15 points and 10 rebounds. Junior Tyler Cheese matched the 15 points, while fellow senior Channel Banks added10.
Unlike their last game against UB, The Zips started strong, connecting on four-of-seven from the field. Three buckets came from deep as Akron built
a pair of seven point leads, the last being 15-8 at the 13:29 mark on a layup by Cristen Jackson.
KSU responded with a 9-0 run to take their first lead of the contest on a steal and layup by Williams.
The Zips responded and opened their largest advantage of the half 31-21 at the 3;23 mark on an emphatic slam dunk by Williams. That gave the visitors a 33-27 edge at intermission.
Neither team shot the ball all that well in the opening 20 minutes. The Zips were 10-of-27 from the field (37 percent) and the Flashes were 11-of-28 (39 percent. Two key stats in UA’s favor were a perfect 10-of-10 from the foul line and had a 19-14 rebounding edge.
At the start of the second half, both teams had quick spurts. After Akron took a 37-31 lead at the 18:05 mark on a foul line extended jumper by Banks, KSU responded with seven unanswered poinrs to regain the lead 38-37 on a pair of free throws by Pippen.
A pair of threes by Banks gave the lead back to UA 43-38 at the 15:19 mark. Again, however, the Flashes went on a run, this time scoring 12 unanswered points to lead by seven 50-43 on q driving layup by Pippen.
From that point on, the game was close with neither team taking as much as a five point advantage.
After UA tied the score 61-all on a floating layup by Cheese, Kent State responded withj a 5-0 spurt to regain the lead 66-61 at the 3:27 mark when Williams connected both ends of a one and one free throw.
It was then Akron’s turn for a run, and they reeled off six straight points to give UA its final lead 67-66 on a layup by Cristen Jackson with 38.2 second remaining.
The winning basket came on a play when Williams drove to the basket and missed the shot. Whittington got a little bit of space and made the put-back.
When asked about the winning play, Senderoff said “It was a play for Booman (Williams). He had great penetration to the basket and got the ball to the rim and Phil was able to tip it in.”
The Zips used their final timeout immediately after the basket. Cristen Jackson pushed the ball up the floor and gave the ball to Banks, who hesitated, made a step backward and missed a three from the left arc in the final second.
NOTES:
>> KSU shot 42.1 percent from the field (8-of-18) from three point range while UA went 24-of-60 (40 percent)
>> The Zips won the rebound battle 37-33. This after allowing 52 rebounds (17 offensive) on Tuesday night against UB.
>> Both teams shot the ball well from the foul line (12 of 15 for KSU, UA was 12-of-14.
>> One key stat was UA turning the ball over 15 times which was convered into 26 KSU points the game had nine lead changes and eight times
>> UA gets back to action nest Saturday when Eastern Michigan comes to Rhodes Arena. KSU faces Ball State on Tuesday night also at home.