WKU Hilltopper Basketball dug deep Saturday night and gutted out a win to remember.
Trailing by five with 36 seconds to play, the Hilltoppers (7-3) stormed back to force overtime and powered past previously undefeated Arkansas 86-79 in front of 6,862 fans at E.A. Diddle Arena.
“I’m awful proud of our guys,” WKU head coach Rick Stansbury said. “I thought we showed a lot of grit and a lot of toughness. We were down late in that game after we’d lost (sophomore center) Charles (Bassey). You could very easily let some emotion leave your body, but we didn’t do it. I thought our guys took their emotion to another level.”
A win seemed improbable for the Hilltoppers down 70-64 with 1:03 left in regulation, but WKU continued to chip away behind the scoring of junior guard Taveion Hollingsworth.
Graduate senior guard Camron Justice drew a charge to give WKU the ball back down 73-70 with 31 seconds to play, and redshirt senior guard/forward Jared Savage buried the tying 3 from the corner to force overtime.
“Shoutout to Coach and all my teammates for trusting in me,” Savage said. “They drew up a play for me, and I just shot it. That’s what I work for all the time. I’m in the gym all the time shooting shots like that. Everyone wants to hit the game-tying shot, so it was nice.”
WKU junior guard Josh Anderson scored off the tip in OT, and the Hilltoppers scored six of the final seven points of the game to pull away.
The victory improves WKU to 8-4 against Power Five opponents since the start of the 2017-18 season.
Hollingsworth led WKU with 23 points, nine rebounds and six assists, while Anderson provided 15 points and six rebounds in 32 minutes off the bench.
“When I got in the game, I was just playing my role,” Anderson said. “Come in, bring energy to the team, trying to play great defense. I thought I got to the rims a lot better than I’ve been doing, and just play hard. That’s me. That’s what I do.”
Savage had 14 points and six rebounds and Justice chipped in 12 points.
Bassey had 10 points and six rebounds before suffering a left leg injury with 3:40 remaining in regulation. WKU has no additional update on Bassey’s status at this time, but will provide more information as it’s available.
WKU led 33-28 at halftime and extended it to seven with a jumper to start the second half from Hollingsworth, but Arkansas (8-1) went on a 16-4 run over the next four minutes, charging ahead 44-39 with 15:33 left on a 3-pointer by Isaiah Joe.
After Bassey’s injury, WKU found itself in front 63-62 until Arkansas sank two straight 3s from Joe and Desi Sills to open a 68-63 advantage with 1:40 left.
That lead swelled to six with just over a minute left until the Hilltoppers kicked their comeback effort into high gear in front of a roaring crowd.
“It was cracking,” Hollingsworth said. “It was super loud. You really couldn’t hear yourself think. They were a really big part of how we came back in that game. Hearing that and them showing a lot of love, for them to come out and support us tonight, it meant a lot.”
WKU improved to 4-1 in overtime games under Stansbury, with each of those victories coming by at least seven points in the extra period.
The Hilltoppers shot 46.3 percent overall and held Arkansas to 41.8 percent, including 2-for-7 shooting in overtime.
WKU put up 25 more points than the previous most allowed this season by the Razorbacks, who entered Saturday as one of the nation’s top defensive teams and 1 of 14 remaining unbeatens. Sills paced Arkansas with 18 points.
The Hilltoppers now have a long break before returning to regular-season action. They’ll face Kentucky Wesleyan in an in-season exhibition on Dec. 17 in Diddle Arena before getting back into their season at Rhode Island on Dec. 21.