Ramey, No. 17 Texas beat Davidson
Courtney Ramey had the goahead driving score with 20 seconds left to help No. 17 Texas hold off Davidson 78-76 in Monday’s opening game of the relocated Maui Invitational.
Ramey’s score broke a 76-all tie, then the Longhorns (2- 0) came up with a pair of stops on the final possession, when the Wildcats (1-1) had a chance to tie or win. Davidson’s Sam Mennenga missed a contested 3-pointer from the wing, but the Wildcats got another shot when the ball went out of bounds with 3.8 seconds left.
The Wildcats inbounded again to Mennenga, who missed a final 3 for the win with Texas’ Andrew Jones closely defending him. Mennenga turned toward the official at the horn, while Davidson coach Bob McKillop also protested slightly before leaving the court.
Ramey scored 14 points to lead the Longhorns, who shot 48% and had six players in double figures. Jones finished with 13 points in his season debut, as did Kai Jones.
Mennenga scored 17 points to lead Davidson, which shot nearly 57%.
Texas thrice built sevenpoint leads in the second half, the last time coming
on Jericho Sims’ whistledrawing dunk to make it 72-65 with 5:06 left. But Davidson hung in and never let Texas stretch that lead, then fought back to tie it on Luka Brajkovic’s hook shot with 62 seconds left to set up the final sequence.
The tournament is being played in the North Carolina mountains instead of its traditional Hawaii setting due to the coronavirus pandemic, giving the Wildcats a home- state game with seats filled by fan cutouts and pumped-in crowd noise.
NO. 14 NORTH CAROLINA 78, UNLV 51 >>
Freshman R. J. Davis scored 16 points and North Carolina overcame an ugly start to beat UNLV in the first round of the re
located Maui Invitational.
Garrison Brooks added 14 points and surpassed the 1,000-point mark for his career in the first half for the Tar Heels (2- 0), who fell behind 13- 0 and didn’t score for the first 6 1/2 minutes. But UNC gradually closed the gap, then had a 28- 4 run spanning halftime to build its own big lead on the way to a rout.
The Tar Heels got a big contribution from senior reserve Andrew Platek, who had 11 points and hit a pair of first-half 3-pointers as UNC sputtered out of the tipoff.
Bryce Hamilton scored 15 points for the Runnin’ Rebels (0-2), who went from hitting everything to missing everything as the Tar
Heels took over. After that 5-for- 5 start, UNLV made just 13 of 57 shots (22.8%) the rest of the way, while the Tar Heels snagged seemingly every errant shot to finish with a 54-35 rebounding advantage.
West Region CALIFORNIA 60, NICHOLLS 49 >>
Matt Bradley tied a career- high with 26 points and Grant Anticevich scored 11 and California fought Nicholls in the Bears’ home opener.
Bradley’s layup off a Nicholls turnover gave Cal a 51-36 lead with 3:22 left to go. But the Bears struggled against the Colonels’ press, turned it over on three consecutive possessions in the last 90 seconds, and Ty Gordon’s layup with 32 seconds remaining got Nicholls within 54- 46.
Bradley helped preserve the win with six-made foul shots in the last 28 seconds to send Cal to 2-1.
CAL STATE NORTHRIDGE 76, SEATTLE 65 >> T. J. Starks scored 20 points and Cal State Northridge beat Seattle.
Lance Coleman II had 13 points for Cal State Northridge (2-1) and Amound Anderson added 12. Darius Brown II had eight assists, moving into seventh on the school career list, passing Troy Brown, who had 316 assists from 1984-88.