Tulsa
Southern Miss
Tulsa Rallies Past Southern Miss 60-52
2/10/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Feb. 10, 2010
Box Score | Quotes | Notes
Box Score 
TULSA, Okla. (AP) - It took 35 minutes, but Tulsa finally solved the puzzle of how to get the ball to Jerome Jordan, the Hurricane's seven-foot center, in its 60-52 victory over Southern Mississippi Wednesday.
"Jerome was getting fronted and he kept trying to battle the front," said TU coach Doug Wojcik. "I said why don't you go over and shake (USM coach) Larry Eustachy's hand."
Instead, Jordan and the Hurricane successfully switched tactics, going to the lob over the aggressive fronts. Jordan scored 12 of his 14 points in the final 4:31 as Tulsa pulled away.
"They played great defense and did a good job taking me out of the game," Jordan said. "We went to some different looks late and I was able to get the ball over the top."
Jordan was 0-2 at halftime and managed his first basket at the 17:42 mark. His two free throws at 4:31 were followed by a slam dunk of a lob from Ben Uzoh, two more free throws, then another converted lob on which he was fouled and made the free throw to put Tulsa ahead 52-44 with 2:11 left. Tulsa became the first team in the past seven games to score as many as 60 points against the defensive-minded visitors.
Uzoh also got off to a slow start but came on to score 13 of his 16 points in the second half. Justin Hurtt also had 16 for Tulsa, including consecutive 3-pointers that gave Tulsa its first lead at 43-42 with 5:12 to play.
Tulsa moved to 8-2 in Conference USA and 19-5 overall while boosting its homecourt winning streak to 23 games, third best in the nation. Southern Miss (4-5 and 14-9) had its four-game winning streak snapped, despite 19 points from forward Gary Flowers.
"I knew it was going to be tough," Wojcik said. "They play great defense and make you work for at least 25 seconds on every possession. Ben started slow again and I'm not sure why. We need to get him going earlier. He's earned the right to be selfish."
Uzoh finished with nine rebounds, six assists, a steal and a block while Jordan had 11 rebounds as Tulsa won the board battle 33-26. The Hurricane shot 65 percent in the second half after a miserable start to finish at 50 percent for the game while USM made just 18 of 54 for 33.3 percent, including a too high lob by Angelo Johnson that banked in for an accidental 3-pointer to start the second half.
The Golden Eagles led 19-10 in the first half and 29-22 early in the second half before Uzoh scored eight of TU's next 10 points as Tulsa knotted the score at 32-32. The game was close from there until Jordan took over late.
"They do a great job defensively, but we found a couple of plays late that worked and went to them," Uzoh said. "Jerome did a good job reading my eyes and looking for the lob."
With one block, Jordan became the all-time C-USA leader in blocked shots with 315, breaking the record of 314 held by East Carolina's Moussa Badiane (2002-05).
Tulsa plays host to Memphis on Saturday at 6 pm in a nationally televised ESPN 2 contest.
