BYU basketball has revealed its weaknesses throughout the season. Ugly free throw shooting and a magnetic lure to coughing up possession among their most prevalent, the Cougars were unable to shake those bad habits as the ball game escaped their reach in the final 10 minutes.
The first half of this one saw both teams catch fire, flushing 41 points each for a grudge match in the second half. While the Cougars came out of the tunnel strong, they met several scoring droughts in the second 20 that ranged from 2 to 5 minutes. The Wildcats remained steady and remained certain as a Big 12 contender would be expected.
After trading leads through the course of the first 30 minutes, Arizona's bloated lead only expanded into new game-highs as finalizing finishes punctuated an 85-74 final.
Arizona offensive rebounds gave the Cougars fits throughout this one, as it felt every time the BYU defense had finally calmed the Wildcat offensive storm, a second chance went right back up to cushion their gap above Kevin Young's team.
Caleb Love, in particular, was deadly from everywhere. Three-balls met no resistance as they skimmed through the nylon, floaters and layups gently tapped off the glass and through at will. He especially lit up the box score in the second half, where he added 10 to his first-half 8 to reach an 18 total.
The surprise of this clash has to be Egor's sudden taste for scoring, as he attacked his shot first and dished the basketball second. The scouting report clearly told Arizona that Demin prefers to get his teammates involved, so they played the passing lanes very hard.
This opened the door for Egor to take aim at his own shot more often than many games have shown early. Unable to distribute as he's most comfortable, BYU's freshman guard forced the ball into perilous environments just as frequently as he could get others to convert. Still lacking adequate strength to finish through contact, he was constantly pestered and bothered while trying to finish at the hole and displayed a hole in his game as several layups failed to fall through the goal.
As the whistle grew less friendly and the foul calls stockpiled on the Cougars in the second, the wind had left the Cougars sails and frustration replaced production. While Arizona was allowed to hound BYU's players off-ball, comparable contact from the Cougars was met with an unforgiving whistle.
The perceived disparity turned to despair for the Cougar faithful and players alike--every setback was greeted with exasperation in BYU's eyes. Defeated and aggravated, BYU looked helplessly as Arizona's lead ballooned from the foul stripe--a competent rate from that zone remains a foreign concept to the Cougars who converted under 60% once again.
Sure, BYU's defense left plenty to be desired as they gave up 85 to a supercharged Arizona team, but the shots just stopped falling for the Cougars as the game shifted to crunch time.
Demin finished with a team-high 16 points, and his scoring spearhead was indicative of the Cougs' ineptitude at converting shots into points. Typically filling more of a distributor role, when Demin leads the way for the offense, that could mean his teammates are struggling to get going. BYU could score when it counted, and the outlook of this game shifted in an unfortunate direction.
Hitting only 29% of their 3-point attempts is highly uncharacteristic of this team, and didn't help Kevin Young's team while the Wildcats knocked through 38% of their long-range attempts. The Cougars fell to 15-7 with this loss, and remain firmly on the bubble in the March Madness picture.