EVANSVILLE, Ind. \u2014 After trailing by 11 points with 14:31 left, Indiana men\u2019s basketball surged late, defeating Western Kentucky University 79-74 on Sunday at the Ford Center. The Cream and Crimson finished exhibition play undefeated.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Both teams began sluggish. The Hoosiers missed their first six shots before junior guard Jaeden Mustaf hit a floater at the 15:45 mark. Western Kentucky made a three on its first possession, but the Hilltoppers connected on just one of their next five shots.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Senior guard Markus Burton hurt his hand and exited less than two minutes into the game. The Mishawaka, Indiana, native returned to the game three minutes later with tape over his fingers, immediately collecting his first assist on his first possession back.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Coming out of the first timeout, freshman forward Trevor Manhertz and senior guard Bryce Lindsay both hit three-pointers. Western Kentucky responded with five straight points, including a three from redshirt junior guard Teagan Moore. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Over the first 15 minutes, Lindsay was 3 for 4 from the field while the rest of the Hoosiers shot 25% (5 for 20). Meanwhile, fifth-year senior forward Sam Alexis tallied three blocks in his first five minutes.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Both teams went on runs throughout the first half. After another three by Moore, Western Kentucky took a 28-20 lead \u2014 its largest of the first half \u2014 before Indiana answered with seven straight points.\u00a0<\/p>\n
With the final seconds winding down in the opening half, Moore hit a buzzer-beating halfcourt shot \u2014 his fourth three-pointer. At halftime, the Hilltoppers held a tight 37-35 advantage. \u00a0<\/p>\n
Western Kentucky opened the second half with a 7-0 run. The Hilltoppers grabbed three offensive boards in the first four minutes, propelling them to a 47-38 lead at the under-16 media timeout.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Hoosiers cut into the lead with two straight threes, but Western Kentucky continued to counter with made shots. Then, the Hoosiers made it a three-point game with 5:57 left.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Indiana freshman guard Prince-Alexander Moody tied the game with a corner three-pointer. The Hilltoppers led 68-65 before Lindsay hit his fourth three of the game to tie the contest.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Over the final three minutes, the Hoosiers outscored Western Kentucky 11-6. With 10 seconds left on the game clock and 1.6 seconds on the shot clock, Alexis scored a tip-in layup to make it 77-72. Freshman forward Vaughn Karvala added four points \u2014 including two game-sealing free throws \u2014 in the final minute.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Hoosiers begin their regular season slate Oct. 2 against Eastern Illinois University at Assembly Hall. Tipoff is set for 7 p.m. and the game will be streamed on Big Ten+.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EVANSVILLE, Ind. \u2014 After trailing by 11 points with 14:31 left, Indiana men\u2019s basketball surged late, defeating Western…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":940868,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[574],"tags":[64,63,726,85],"class_list":["post-940867","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-basketball","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-basketball","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/940867","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=940867"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/940867\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/940868"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=940867"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=940867"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=940867"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}