Tutt saves the day - Tulsa World (3-5-2006)

[ORUTerry]

Tutt saves the day

By MIKE BROWN World Sports Writer

3/5/2006

ORU struggles in opener, but guard's 29 points lift Eagles.

Western Illinois almost sprang another eighth-place nightmare on Oral Roberts University. But the Golden Eagles had something they didn't have in Macomb, Ill., almost six weeks ago.

Junior guard Ken Tutt scored 29 points, carrying the Eagles to a 60-53 gut-wrenching first-round win in the 2006 Mid-Con championships Saturday night at the Union Multipurpose Activity Center.

Tutt, a two-time all-conference honoree his first two years, was sidelined for ORU's 70-65 loss at WIU on Jan. 24, one of 10 games he missed with a broken foot.

"I was hoping they had forgotten about me, and I guess they did a little," Tutt said.

Tutt scored 14 first-half points, picking up the Eagles when they missed 13 of their first 16 shots and trailed by five points. Tutt shot them into a 25-21 halftime lead.

He finished with nine of the Eagles' 20 field goals, all three treys and made 6-of-6 free throws over the final 32 seconds to protect the barest of leads over the Mid-Continent Conference's eighth-place team.

"I still have a hard time (understanding) how that team could win only three conference games," said ORU coach Scott Sutton.

The Leathernecks were 3-13 in conference play.

"They are an athletic team. They have two outstanding athletes. I congratulate them for coming in here to a difficult place, (where) probably nobody thought they could win but their guys, and it was as tough a game as we've been in all year," Sutton said.

ORU led the league in rebounding, but WIU won on the glass 47-43, and whipped the Eagles on the offensive boards, earning 22 second chances.

"We're one of the few teams to outrebound Oklahoma this year. We led the conference in rebounding, and (Western) just kicked our tails," Sutton said.

But two of the game's biggest plays were ORU offensive rebounds.

A nine-point lead had slipped to one with 7:21 left when ORU freshman Marchello Vealy scored with Caleb Green's miss and was fouled. Vealy missed his free throw, but Green rebounded and scored.

The four-point play gave ORU a 43-38 lead, and WIU never got closer than four the rest of the way.

ORU (19-11) advanced to play in the semifinals at 6 p.m. Monday against fourth-seeded Valparaiso or fifth-seeded Southern Utah. Valpo plays Southern Utah on Sunday. Western Illinois ended the season at 7-21.

Scoreless in the first half, Green scored 14 second-half points and finished with 14 rebounds, notching his 14th double-double this season.

With Green in first-half foul trouble and the Eagles shooting poorly, the game was a template of Western Illinois' earlier upset -- with one other exception.

This time, the Eagles held David Jackson to eight first-half points and 20 overall. Jackson shot the Leathernecks into a 14-point first-half lead in Macomb, hitting 6-of-7 shots with four 3-pointers.

On Saturday, The Eagles had 6-foot-9 Yemi Ogunoye covering the 6-foot-4 Jackson and gave Ogunoye plenty of help.

"We learned our lesson about Jackson the last time," Sutton said. "We didn't think he could shoot it, and he knocked down his first four treys."

WIU's inside pillars -- Fred Oguns, Eliz Cepeda and NaVonta Kentle -- combined for 28 points and 28 rebounds.

Sutton said winning was a relief for the Eagles, whose last game in the UMAC was last year's loss to Oakland in the final of the Mid-Con Tournament.

"Last year, in the first round and the semifinals, we played as well as we played all year, and then we played bad against Oakland in the championship game.

"I told our guys in the locker room, hopefully we got our bad game out of the way and can play good games Monday night and Tuesday," Sutton said.