Virginia nips W. Kentucky in 2OT

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Posted 6:03AM on Thursday, January 6, 2005

CHARLOTTESVILLE, VIRGINIA - It was the perfect ending to a perfectly bizarre basketball game, and it left Pete Gillen shaking his head. ``I told the guys during the game, `We're going to win,''' Gillen said after the Cavaliers beat Western Kentucky 80-79 in double overtime Wednesday night. ``I told them two or three times during the game. ``A couple times, I had my doubts.'' The ending came after a sequence that had players from both teams diving all over the floor scrambling to control a loose ball, each side seeming to have possession more than once. Then Gary Forbes got it, passed it to T.J. Bannister and Bannister laid it in with 2.6 seconds left. ``I've been in college basketball 30 years. I don't remember a game like that, double overtime, where the ball's on the ground for four or five seconds. It probably was two seconds. It seemed like four or five,'' Gillen said, his shirt collar still soaked and his forehead glistening. Western Kentucky (10-2) led most of the way and forced the second extra period on a basket with eight-tenths of a second left, but the frenzied finish left coach Darrin Horn wondering how it got away. ``I need to see the film,'' a dejected Horn said. ``I've got a feeling I might be disappointed that we didn't have somebody on the floor, which we pride ourselves on, to come up with that basketball.'' Virginia's Jason Clark was among those fighting for the ball. ``That was great,'' Clark said. ``All I know is I was on the ground and pretty soon everyone was on the ground. Both teams really wanted it.'' Bannister's basket, only his second of the game, gave the Cavaliers the victory on a night when they were undermanned because scoring leader Devin Smith missed his second straight game with an ankle injury and J.R. Reynolds played despite being sick all day because of food poisoning. Reynolds wound up leading the Cavaliers (9-2) with 20 points. ``He had the heart of a lion to do that,'' Gillen said, noting the shooting guard was dehydrated because he'd been vomiting all day. Western Kentucky seemed to have won in regulation until Elgrace Wilborn was called for goaltending on Clark's tip at the buzzer. In the first overtime, the Cavaliers blew a 5-point lead as Anthony Winchester hit a 3-pointer with 21.5 seconds left and Courtney Lee scored on a drive down the middle with eight-tenths of a second remaining. The Cavaliers also nearly lost the ball twice in the final sequence before Forbes emerged, found Bannister and he made the winning play. Reynolds and Clark, who had 16 points, tied their career highs. Clark added nine rebounds and Elton Brown had 10 points and 12 rebounds. The Hilltoppers lost despite 30 points, 11 rebounds and four assists from Winchester, a 6-foot-4 guard, and 20 points from Lee, whose two free throws with 32.8 seconds left gave Western Kentucky a 79-78 lead. Lee scored all but two of his points after halftime. Forbes' layup off a feed from Clark with 38.4 seconds left gave Virginia its first lead of the second overtime at 77-76, but Lee made both shots when Forbes fouled him immediately after taking the inbounds pass. Then came the final sequence.