The Tigers have seen this story before.
Austin Nichols went down with a sprained right ankle in the second half of a game at FedExForum, and Memphis failed to cope without him.
Unlike the Temple game, the Tigers (17-12, 9-7 American Athletic Conference) made it to overtime before falling to the Tulsa Golden Hurricane (21-7, 14-2 AAC) on Saturday, 74-72, after Nick King’s game-winning three-point attempt fell short in Memphis’ final home game of the season.
Memphis is now in sixth place in the AAC standings after losing their second home game this week. A first-round bye looks highly unlikely especially since coach Josh Pastner said after the game Nichols will probably miss at least the next two weeks, he reinjured the same right ankle he did in the Temple game on Feb. 7. Nichols finished the game with nine points on 4-5 shooting in 16 minutes.
Pastner said his team played hard, but the breaks just haven’t gone in favor of the Tigers this season.
"It was just one of those games,” Pastner said. “The guys battled and played their butts off. This was just one of those years that the breaks have not gone our way: the calls haven't gone our way; the ball hasn't bounced our way; the injury bug has not gone our way. All you can ask is a shot to win it at the end and Nick (King) had a great look at the three. We can have peace about that and live with that.”
Memphis shot 43 percent from the field in the loss, while allowing Tulsa to shoot 50 percent from the floor.
Nevertheless, even without the injured Nichols the Tigers still had plenty of opportunities to win the game. The Tigers left 11 points at the free throw line going 13-24 for the game.
Shaq Goodwin who shot 2-6 from the line in the game said regardless of the Tigers' free throw miscues, the opportunity to win the game was still there.
“We had a chance to win the game regardless of what the free throw count was,” Goodwin said after the loss. “Regardless of what the turnovers were or the percentages were we had a chance to win it, we just came up a little short. We will live with that because our effort was maxed this game."
Goodwin did continue his stretch of strong play as of late though as he led the Tigers with 17 points, six rebounds, three assists and two rebounds in the loss.
The game always seemed like it would come down to the last few possessions even after the Tigers built a 27-18 lead over the Golden Hurricane with 5:18 left in the first half.
Nichols’ injury virtually guaranteed it. However, Memphis would actually make a 22-7 run without him, to take a 60-51 lead over Tulsa with 7:44 left in the second half.
Trahson Burrell had a solid game for the Tigers after a difficult stretch. He had 12 points, including the shot to send the game to overtime, eight rebounds and four assists in 34 minutes.
While the Tigers did a good job of limiting Tulsa guard James Woodward to 10 points, others stepped up for Tulsa.
Golden Hurricane guard Rashad Ray who came into the game averaging only seven points a game, scored a season-high 18 points, and shot 4-7 from long range.
His fellow guard Shaquille Harrison outscored the Tigers in overtime eight to six, including hitting his only three-pointer of the game with 31 seconds to go to give Tulsa a 74-69 lead in the extra session. Harrison finished the game with 23 points and nine rebounds.
Burrell said the Tigers stopped playing as hard on defense as they played earlier in the game, and that helped Harrison get going late in the game.
"We tried not to let him get going but when you play that kind of defense you let some go,” Burrell said. “We started not playing as hard on defense as we were in the first half so we let some things slide."
The Tigers will hope to end their two-game slide when they take on the UConn Huskies at the Gampel Pavillon in Hartford, Connecticut, on Thursday at 8 p.m. ESPN2 will televise the game.
