Tulsa Season Ends with 81-63 loss to Wichita State in First Round of Conference Tournament

Thursday, March 9

Fort Worth, Texas

6:00 PM

Tulsa

5-25,1-17AAC

Wichita State

17-14,9-9AAC

Tulsa

Wichita St.

Photo by: Andy Hancock/American Athletic Conference

Tulsa Season Ends with 81-63 loss to Wichita State in First Round of Conference Tournament

3/9/2023 9:41:00 PM | Men's Basketball

Box Score

Gamebook (PDF) | Season Stats (PDF) | Tulsa Quotes

TULSA, Okla. –– The Golden Hurricane men's basketball team fell 81-63 in the first round of the American Athletic Conference Championship to Wichita State in Dickies Arena on Thursday evening.

The University of Tulsa finishes its season with a 5-25 record, 1-17 in The American. Wichita State improves to 17-14, 9-9 in the AAC and sweep the season series. The Shockers move on to face #3 Tulane on Friday evening.

"Our game plan was to try to limit those (2-point baskets) as much as possible, try to force some contested long-distance shots," Tulsa head coach Eric Konkol said. "I thought we did that for a good part of the first half fairly successfully, and then the second half just got away from us there. They were able to get the ball inside with some offensive rebounds, some really good interior passing."

"But proud of our guys for their fight. This has been a challenging year, but one thing that's been consistent is guys have shown up, Tim (Dalger) here to my left included, just trying to get better every day. So appreciative of them for how they battled here this year."

Dalger led all scorers with 21 points and tied his career high with five 3-pointers. Bryant Selebangue finished with 12 points and seven rebounds. Brandon Betson dished out seven assists alongside his nine points. On the other side of the court, five Shockers finished in double figures, led by three who all scored 13.

Wichita State shot 57 percent from the floor while limiting Tulsa to 41 percent. TU knocked down 10 triples at a 36 percent clip, while WSU hit six while shooting 33 percent from deep. The rebounding battle went the way of Wichita State 35-26, as did points in the paint, 48-24.

The Hurricane shot the ball much better in the second half, knocking down 52 percent of its shots while only hitting 29 percent in the first. However, the Shockers knocked down a blistering 65.5 in the final frame, which allowed Wichita State to pull away.

The Shockers came flying out of the gates, scoring the first 10 points of the game and holding Tulsa scoreless for nearly six minutes. Tulsa finally got on the board with a stepback jumper from Betson, which was quickly answered by a triple for Wichita State.

As they have done all season, TU didn't stop fighting despite the early deficit. A Selebangue layup and Dalger's first triple halved the lead. As the teams battled, Betson and freshman BB Knight connected on back-to-back threes and suddenly the lead was just 17-16 with under 10 to play in the half.

Tulsa would cut the lead to one multiple times but was never able to take the lead in the ballgame. For the remainder of the half, the Shockers were unable to extend their lead past six. Jesaiah McWright split a pair of free throws with seconds remaining in the half to send Tulsa to the break trailing 30-25.

The second half started much like the first, as the Shockers quickly extended the lead to 12, 37-25, with a 12-0 run. The lead would stay in double digits for good when Craig Porter Jr. hit a driving layup off a Tulsa turnover to make the score 41-31 with 16:04 to play.

From there, Wichita State didn't go on a massive run, but its lead gradually grew as Tulsa struggled to get stop son the defensive end, culminating in a game-high 26-point lead, 79-53, with 3:34 remaining.

The Hurricane would outscore the Shockers 10-2 the rest of the way, highlighted by Charles Chukwu two-hand dunk and a smooth and-one reverse layup from Peyton Urbancic as time ticked away.