Southern Illinois stormed back from a 12-point deficit to stun Oklahoma State, 61-60, on Thursday night at Gallagher-Iba Arena.
"I'm just happy for them (the team). They put all this work in over the last five or six months and this is why guys love college basketball and why guys come here to have moments like this," head coach Bryan Mullins said after the win. "They've worked extremely hard so it's great to just see them in the locker room like that."
Senior forward Marcus Domask knocked down the winning bucket — a 3-pointer from the left corner with 22 seconds remaining — to give the Salukis (2-0) their first Power Five road win since beating Colorado in the NIT in 2000.
Southern jumped out to an early 13-4 lead after six minutes, as Troy D'Amico, Lance Jones and Domask all buried threes.
Southern scored just one basket during the next seven minutes, a Domask layup, allowing the Cowboys (1-1) to chip away at the lead. By halftime, OSU led, 33-28.
"We showed incredible poise – down 10 points for most of the second half," Mullins said. "I never felt like the guys on the court or the guys on the bench had not lost their belief that they were going to win the game."
Trailing, 55-45, with 6:43 to go, the Salukis finished the game on a 16-5 run, and all 16 points were scored by either Domask or Lance Jones, who led the team in scoring with 16 and 19 points, respectively.
The resilient Salukis made their comeback despite being outrebounded 43-31. Four of Domask's five field goals came from behind the arc while leading SIU in assists as the forward played nearly 39 minutes in the win.
Following the go-ahead bucket from Domask, it was D'Amico who drew the assignment on defense, forcing OSU's Bryce Thompson into a contested midrange shot before corralling the rebound and securing the win. D'Amico also added eight points in the win on 3-for-6 shooting.
After OSU shot 50 percent from the field in the first half, Southern held the Cowboys to just 34.5 percent in the final 20 minutes of play.
UP NEXT
The Salukis travel to Southern Indiana on Sunday with tipoff set for 3 p.m. CT from Screaming Eagles Arena. The game will air on ESPN Plus.
Original source can be found here.
Alerts Sign-up