CLEVELAND – Tyrone Sally's slam-dunk basket with two seconds left lifted West Virginia to a come-from-behind 63-61 victory over Creighton in an NCAA tournament first round game Thursday night at the Wolstein Center in Cleveland, Ohio.
Sally's game-winning basket came as the result of his terrific defensive play with the clock winding down and the game tied at 61. Nate Funk appeared to have a wide open look at a three-point shot that Sally was able to get a piece of. The ball came down into Kevin Pittsnogle hands, who made a great outlet pass to Mike Gansey at midcourt.
Gansey found Sally wide open at the other end of the floor for an easy slam dunk with 2.4 seconds remaining.
"I just tried to close out and make it as difficult a shot as I could or get a piece of it and somehow I got a piece of it and the ball found Kevin," said Sally. "He just hit Mike who found me and it seemed like the perfect fast break.
"When Mike threw me the ball I was just going to get it up there as fast as I could," Sally added.
After a pair of timeouts, Creighton coach Dana Altman designed a play for Funk on the wing that created a great look at a potential game-winning three. But Funk's shot from the near wing hit the backside of the bank board and fell harmlessly to the floor as the clock expired.
"I was sitting on the bench and from where I was sitting it looked perfect but it was just a little bit long," said center Kevin Pittsnogle.
The tempo of the game was controlled by Creighton, which jumped out to a 10-0 lead as West Virginia worked out its early-game jitters.
A Dane Watts basket forced West Virginia coach John Beilein to call a quick 30-second timeout at 16:48. The Mountaineers responded with 10 straight points to tie the game, and then went on a 21-7 run after they trailed 15-10 to take a 31-19 with five minutes to go in the first half.
At that point Creighton's pressure defense and full court trapping caused three West Virginia turnovers and a bad three-point shot attempt from Pittsnogle to get back into the game. The Blue Jays used a 12-2 run to close the first half down just two, 33-31.
Creighton (23-11) used a 13-6 run at the start of the second half to build its lead to five, 44-39. Back to back threes by Funk and another three by Dane Watts keyed the run. A Jeffrey Day alley oop dunk following a great inbound play designed by Altman completed an impressive Creighton run.
"I don't know why everybody was expecting us to overlook Creighton because the past couple of years they've made noise in the tournament and we came out here trying to give it our all and try to advance somehow some way."
At one point in the first half when Sally was struggling, the fans gave an ovation to Sally's backup Frank Young when he came into the game. To his credit the classy Sally didn't perceive the applause as a slight to him.
"It made me feel good because Frank is like my brother and he was doing good out there," said Sally. "Frank gave us a big lift off the bench just like he was doing since the Providence game earlier this year and it seems like we just feed off that."
The Blue Jays led 53-48 after a pair of Watts free throws before West Virginia came to life.
J.D. Collins sank a pair of free throws with 6:16 remaining to pull West Virginia to within three, 53-50, and Sally was able to follow that up with a three from the wing to tie the game at 53 with 5:40 to go.
A Gansey dunk with 5:15 remaining gave the Mountaineers their first lead of the second half, 57-55. Funk answered with a tough three with 2:30 to give the lead back to the Blue Jays 58-57.
Collins made another pair of free throws gave the lead back to West Virginia before Kellen Miliner nailed a huge three-pointer to make it 61-59, Creighton. It was the 10th lead change of the game.
Creighton had a chance to extend its lead after getting the ball back off a Joe Herber turnover but Tyler McKinney was unable to convert a lay up with a minute left.
On the other end Sally was fouled going to the basket and he was able to tie the game at 61 with a pair of free throws with 42 seconds left.
Sally finished the game with 12 points after scoring just one basket in the first half. Pittsnogle led the Mountaineers with 17 points on six of 13 shooting. The junior led WVU with six rebounds. Gansey contributed 13 points. Frank Young came off the bench to score eight and Collins had another solid all-around game with seven points and a team-high seven assists.
"At the end of the game I couldn't hit anyting and my tammates picked me up," said Pittsnogle. "Tyrone hit some big shots and J.D. hit some big free throws -- it was just a lot of teamwork tonight and it just came out for the best."
Funk scored a game-high 23 points for Creighton. Johnny Mathies added 16 before fouling out with 2:21 remaining in the game.
The game couldn't have been closer statistically. Both teams made eight of 21 three-point field goal attempts and 11 of 13 from the free throw line and both shot in the 40-percent range.
The difference was West Virginia's 12 steals and 15 assists on 22 field goals.
The victory boosts the Mountaineers' record to 22-10 and moves them into a second round game Saturday against No. 2-seeded Wake Forest, which beat No. 14 seed Tennessee-Chattanooga 70-54 in the first game Thursday night. It was also John Beilein's 500th win of his coaching career.
"I think Wake Forest was top five all year and I think it's going to be a great game because basically we know who we're playing right now; we're more familiar with them and just having a great team like that on this kind of stage is going to be a great opportunity," said Sally.
"We know about Wake Forest, we've watched them a lot of TV this year and they're a great team," added Pittsnogle. "They're the fifth number one seed I guess you could say and it's going to be fun to play the. We watched them play a little bit tonight and they're a great all-around team."
The contest will tip off at 8 pm and will be televised nationally by CBS. Air time for the MSN radio broadcast is 7:30 pm.
