Exhale.
Late Friday afternoon, Bartow Arena hosted one of its most exciting games in recent memory. A struggling UAB squad, needing a win to keep their season on track, pulled out an exhilarating 79-78 overtime victory over the Drake Bulldogs. Painfully close for all 45 minutes, it was the definition of a thriller.
The matchup was a tale of two teams on vastly different trajectories. Boasting a pristine 11-1 record, Drake carried an eight-game winning streak into Bartow. Two weeks prior, they had smashed KenPom #42 Nevada; some analysts were floating the Bulldogs as a potential at-large candidate come March. Their KenPom ranking was 71st, higher than any UAB opponents outside Maryland and Clemson.
UAB, conversely, had lost three out of their last five: a home blowout administered by McNeese State, a heartbreaker against Southern Miss, and a slaughter at the hands of a terrible Arkansas State. The Drake game was played on December 22nd; the Blazers hadn't beaten a D1 team other than Alabama A&M since November 25th. Backs against the wall, the Green and Gold couldn't let this one slip away.
And they didn't.
Butta Johnson opened the game with five quick points, nailing a three and a midrange jumper. This established a welcome respite for UAB: good shooting. The Blazers had struggled mightily from the floor during their rough patch, a particular lowlight being their 19/64 (29.7%) performance against McNeese. Johnson's early success was prescient: throughout the afternoon, UAB would take (generally) good shots, making most of them. On the night, the Green and Gold went 50.9% from the field and 40% from three.
Drake thrived around the rim in the opening period, using backdoor cuts to secure multiple uncontested layups. This was a familiar struggle - lackadaisical first-half defense digging the Blazers into a daunting hole. However, UAB's shooting proficiency, along with a perhaps generous whistle, kept the Green and Gold afloat. With just two minutes to go before halftime, the Bulldogs extended their lead to seven, but seven straight Blazer points off free throws evened the score going into the break.
UAB tightened up their defense in the second period - the easy looks Drake had once feasted on became rare. Bulldog star Tucker DeVries, nigh-unguardable in the first half, struggled against the Blazer pressure. Although still dangerous, he turned the ball over three times down the stretch and could not find his stroke from beyond the arc. The Green and Gold were in the driver's seat and made multiple spirited efforts to pull away. I counted three separate times the Blazer lead hit six in the second half.
But no matter what UAB did, Colby Garland, Atin Wright, or DeVries would respond. Tony Toney three? DeVries layup. Yaxel Lendeborg floater? Wright three. Christian Coleman jumper? Garland free throws. Drake was flawless from the charity stripe - the Bulldogs made all 12 of their FT attempts. The scrappy, well-coached MVC squad simply wouldn't roll over.
Wright was particularly heroic for Drake. The guard scored eight points in the last ten minutes of regulation, almost single-handedly keeping his team breathing. He took every inch of space the Blazers gave him and quickly punished them for slacking. UAB defenders couldn't stay in front of him off the bounce, as Andy Kennedy alluded to in his postgame radio interview.
1:18 remained as Wright nailed a clutch driving layup to make the score 69-67 in favor of the Blazers. An ugly UAB possession resulted in a tough three-point attempt from Eric Gaines, which clanked off the mark. On the other end of the court, Drake's Darnell Brodie dumped in the tying bucket. The scoreboard now read :17. The shot clock was off. The Blazers had a chance to win it.
After wasting about ten seconds, Gaines darted into the paint, drawing Drake's Kyron Gibson away from Daniel Ortiz, who stood in the corner. EG made the correct read, whipped the ball to the UNA transfer, and...
4.3 seconds remaining. UAB 72, Drake 69.
Ortiz was mobbed on the bench, having hit one of the most important shots of his career. In his radio presser, Gaines admitted the Blazer sideline thought the game was over. After all, UAB had a foul to give, and Drake had to travel the court's length.
The Blazers gave said foul, awarding the Bulldogs an inbounds play on the far sideline with 2.2 seconds on the clock. Shadowed by Christian Coleman and Yaxel Lendeborg, Tucker DeVries streaked past halfcourt and...
After the game, Kennedy said that the Blazers wanted to foul again, but Coleman and Lendeborg elected not to because DeVries had already assumed a three-point stance. I've seen many people frame this as a failure on the part of UAB, that they should've fouled faster, that they should've had someone in front of the inbounder. The execution wasn't perfect, clearly, but in my opinion, Coleman and Lendeborg were justified in playing it safe. You'd rather make DeVries hit a pullup 25-footer than give him three free throws. This was just a hell of a play by one of the best mid-major players in the country.
It was also a potential soul-crushing development for a team that desperately needed something to go their way. UAB had already endured a devastating overtime loss to an MVC team - Bradley had broken their hearts in the season's first game. Nothing had come easy since: the Clemson, Maryland, and MTSU games were all decided on the last possession, and the recent losing streak had been downright demoralizing. At last, it appeared the Blazers had caught a break - and Tucker DeVries snatched it away.
But UAB played with energy and zeal from the moment overtime tipped off. Yaxel Lendeborg opened the extra period with a physical offensive rebound, which resulted in a Javian Davis layup. Drake, of course, battled back, always staying within striking distance of the Blazers, but their opponents were valiant. With :54 seconds remaining, Ortiz hit another huge shot, swishing a jumper off the bounce to give the home team a three-point lead. UAB, in the aftermath of yet another heartbreak, refused to fold.
As everyone in the building could've predicted, the game came down to the final ten seconds. After making two free throws to cut the Blazer advantage to just one, Atin Wright barreled down the court with a chance to win it. The tension was palpable, as the sobbing little girl in front of me could attest to. Even a foul call would likely gift a victory to the Bulldogs.
Wright slashed into the paint, working on Ortiz, trying to craft a moment to match his three's magnitude. The Drake guard swerved past the restricted area and tossed up a tough floater, which didn't connect with anything. The errant shot landed in Darnell Brodie's hands, but UAB's Lendeborg swatted it away, getting fouled in the process. After missing two meaningless free throws, Yax touched the ball and ran out the remaining 20 milliseconds.
UAB 79, Drake 78 (OT).
The Blazers are now 7-5. UAB's next game is on Friday, December 29th, when they take on a solid UNC-Asheville team in Bartow. They'll play their first AAC game on January 2nd against old foe UTSA.
Takeaways
Although he struggled from the field, Eric Gaines found plenty of other ways to contribute. The point guard made just three of his 13 field goals but finished with nine points, seven rebounds, nine assists, one block, and one steal. Despite serving as UAB's primary ballhandler for 38 minutes, EG only turned it over twice. Over the last two games, his assist-to-turnover ratio is now 13:4.
This was one of the better passing performances Gaines has put on in his time at UAB. As evidenced by his assist numbers, he made the right reads time and time again. Daniel Ortiz's late regulation three was an incredible feat of composure by DT, but the play was successful in large part due to Gaines. He managed the clock well, drove just deep enough into the paint to suck the defenders in, and delivered a precise pass to Ortiz. After the game, EG revealed that "the initial play was for me to go get a bucket, but I didn’t want to force it up." His no-look dime to Christian Coleman was also supremely impressive.
Granted, Gaines made several decisions that caused Kennedy to kick his chair. He fired off some threes that likely should've gone to Butta Johnson - EG went 0-5 from beyond the arc. The last offensive possession of overtime ended in an off-balance Gaines floater that caused a man sitting behind me to gasp audibly. In his presser, AK openly lamented EG's "figure-skating," imploring him to get downhill.
That's the Eric Gaines Experience, though. At the end of the day, his contributions far outweighed his mistakes - he was a critical engine on both offense and defense.
The bench was massive for the Blazers, perhaps swinging the game in favor of the Green and Gold. The UAB reserves scored a combined 22 points on 8/11 shooting; Drake's bench players scored just eight on 3/7 shooting. Alejandro Vasquez was fine but not brilliant, finishing with three points in 15 minutes. He sparked a Blazer run midway through the first half, getting to the free-throw line twice in a minute. Christian Coleman and Daniel Ortiz, on the other hand, were invaluable.
Coleman didn't miss a field goal, putting up eight points on four shots. "Made a couple jump shots, can you believe that?" joked Kennedy after the game. "He doesn't do that very often." Drake was in drop coverage in the second half, trying to deny drives from Eric Gaines. Twice this left Coleman wide open at the charity stripe, and twice Coleman made the Bulldogs pay. The only thing that marred his performance was two late missed free throws.
Ortiz, obviously, will be remembered for the massive three he hit at the end of regulation, but he played an efficient game regardless. This was the platonic ideal of a Daniel Ortiz performance, what I imagine Kennedy expected from him when he secured his commitment. The guard finished with the highest offensive rating on the team, making three of his four three-point attempts and his lone two-point attempt, a crucial jumper with 54 seconds left in overtime. AK cited his shooting as a separator in UAB's victory.
The Huntsville guys, Tony Toney and Butta Johnson, had been inconsistent against high-level competition up to this point. Both men got the start against Drake and proved they deserved it.
Toney rarely erred in his 29 minutes on the court. He finished with the team's second-highest offensive rating because of his efficient shot selection - he went 2-3 from deep and 1-2 from two, the two-point miss coming on a tough transition layup. The junior guard also made both of his free throws. His hustle and defensive pressure were widely praised on both Twitter and the broadcast.
AK cited his shooting as a difference-maker in the Blazer victory.
Butta provided an essential initial spark to get the Blazers rolling: the sophomore dropped eight points in the game's first ten minutes. His performance after halftime could have been more statistically impressive - Butta scored just two in the final 25 minutes - but Johnson played hard, tough defense, staying in front of Drake's dangerous guards as best he could.
The defense started slow but improved over throughout the game. In the first half, Drake decimated UAB with heads-up passing and backdoor cuts - the Bulldogs probably scored 25% of their points uncontested at the rim. The Blazers never truly locked down the paint: even in the second half and overtime, Drake continued to score plenty of buckets inside. However, they were less a product of lazy defense and more a product of the talent of DeVries, Wright, Garland, and Brodie.
Kennedy did decry UAB's lack of "ball-getters" - he asserted that some of the Blazers' defensive struggles can be attributed to losing out on loose balls.
All things aside, David Crane made the case that this was UAB's best defensive performance of the season if you consider the quality of the opponent. AK joked that "the bar isn't very high," but he didn't shoot it down. There's an argument to be made that Crane is correct; although Tucker DeVries obviously made some huge plays, he made just 3 of his 11 three-point attempts. He was largely contained in the second half and turned the ball over a total of five times. Kennedy gave much of the credit for UAB's defensive success on DeVries to Yaxel Lendeborg.
On the other hand, Atin Wright was simply unstoppable, but the Blazers did a good job limiting the damage his teammates did. Per KenPom, Drake had a top-70 offense in the nation, but it rarely seemed like they were scoring at will.
The team effort was highly encouraging. DeVries' shot felt like some kind of cosmic joke, another enormous frustration in a series of enormous frustrations. As I've said throughout the article, the Blazers easily could've rolled over and died, but no one slowed down in overtime. Lendeborg was fiery after hitting a huge three. Javian Davis muscled in a physical layup. Gaines continued to play hard, coming up with a hard-earned pickpocket of Colby Garland. The improved shooting helped, of course, but this game was won on the back of effort.
Although this feels like a turning point, the win doesn't guarantee anything, obviously. This isn't Hoosiers - all is not magically solved after overcoming some midseason adversity. As we've seen with this team, things can change extremely quickly. However, it's hard not to be encouraged by what we saw on Friday. UAB is still a threat in the AAC.
Other Notes
Yaxel Lendeborg was one of UAB's most impactful players, despite being relegated to the "Other Notes" section. As previously mentioned, he played excellent defense on DeVries. Yax also made multiple incredibly difficult shots and finished the game with 13 points and eight rebounds.
Javian Davis played 40 minutes but grabbed just two rebounds, his lowest mark of the season. He struggled with cramps throughout the game. Kennedy acknowledged Davis wasn't particularly effective but praised him for making seven of his eight free throws.
UAB went 27-53 (50.9%) from the field, their second-highest mark of the season behind their 34-58 (58.6%) performance against Furman.
UAB shot 8-20 (40%) from three, their second-highest mark of the season behind their 9-22 (40.9%) performance against Clemson.
The Blazers struggled from the free-throw line, making 17 of their 26 attempts (65.4%), their third-worst performance of the season behind the MTSU (13-20, 65%) and Bradley (18-29, 62.1%) games.
UAB was outrebounded 34-28, only the second time this season they've lost the rebounding battle and won (31-33 against Maryland).
Former Blazer center Trey Jemison, now a player for the Birmingham Squadron, was in attendance.
This was former UAB point guard Nick Norton's homecoming. Norton, who serves as Drake's Director of Player Development, returned to Bartow for the first time since 2018, this time as an opponent. Steve Irvine interviewed him before the game.
Eric Gaines (9 points, 9 assists, 7 rebounds) flirted with the first Blazer triple-double since Paul Delaney posted one on February 4th, 2009 against Tulane (16 points, 12 assists, 10 rebounds)