Henderson tossed in Princeton’s loss to BYU
PRINCETON » Call it a moment of madness. Something totally out of character for one of the coolest sideline customers in the Ivy league.
Mitch Henderson got ejected. Princeton’s seventh-year coach was tossed for the first time in his career when he was hit with a double technical after he angrily ripped off his jacket and got into a heated argument with one of the officials at the 6:39 mark of the secondhalf in the Tigers’ 65-56loss to BY U on Wednesday night at Jadwin Gym.
“I’ve gotten four technicals in my life and I doubled that today,” Henderson said. “I just told the guys I ask them to hold themselves to an incredibly high standard and I didn’t do that tonight. It put us in a hole.”
Henderson disagreed with the work of the officiating crew — the Cougars shot 27 free throw to Princeton’ s 12— and it finally spilled over when therewas ano-call as Tigers player drove to the basket and drew contact at the end of the shot clock.
“I got emotional,” Henderson said. “Can I say I blacked out. The guys need and deserve the opportunity to compete inthe game without me interfering. That’s totally out of line. Things happen, and I’m not proud of, but I have some improvement to do aswell.”
Assistant Brett Mac Con ne ll took charge for the remainder of the game.
The Cougars’ Elijah Bryant made all four free throws and BYU (2-0) went up 52-43 and held off Princeton (0-2).
The Tigers cut the deficit to56-54with2:59 remaining on Ryan Schwieger’s 3-pointer, but he fouled TJH aw son the next trip and the Cougars’ sophomore made all three free throws.
BYU scored the next nine points to lock up a road win.
“You just know it’s going to be a good win for you that’s going to hang on all year long for us,” Cougars coach Dave Rose said. “It’s a quality win, so we’re excited about that. The gamewas a battle of wills and we made a few more plays at the end.”
Devin Cannady paced Princeton with 19 points on 6-of-13 from the floor, but the visitors did a good job on the other two members of the Tigers’ big three.
Myles Stephens and Amir Bell combined to go 5-for-23 and contributed just 12 points.
“I thought we got to the basket really well, we just didn’t finish,” Cannady said. “Maybe their length had something to dowith that. I think that’s something were going to look at going forward and work on finishing around the rim. I also think that, for me personally, I canget in there and look for open guys.”
Henderson made two changes to the starting lineup from the season opener at Butler, opting for the experience of seniors Mike Le Blanc and Alec Brennan at the forward spots in place of freshmen duo Jerome Desrosiers and Sebastian Much. Princeton was battered inside while Much and Desrosiers combined for one rebound in 23 minutes.
Henderson rotated freely in the first half, using 11 different players around his big three to try and find combinations that worked.
“I don’t like the word searching, but we’re looking for combinations that are going to make us win,” Henderson said. “I thought (Devin) was terrific tonight in terms of leading, and he, Myles and Amir have a challenge ahead of themto find that group, whoever is with themand pull them up.”
Princeton won the battle on the boards 36-23 and grabbed 14 offensive rebounds to BYU’s one. That was a drastic improvement from the game at Butler when the Tigers were out-rebounded 31-18 and didn’t grab a single offensive carom.
“I didn’t think we played very well together as a team on offense,” Henderson said. “On Sunday night, I thought we played well enough to win on offense and were bad defensive ly. Tonight we were very good defensively, except for the fouls, and we couldn’t get it done on offense. There’s a good teamin there somewhere.”
This was the sixth meeting between the two schools and the return game from last year’s contest in Utah thatwas part of ESPN’s nowdefunct Tip-Off Marathon. BYU has won all six matchups.