Washington State is unlikely to end its season on a winning streak but the Cougars finished their home schedule on a high note.

Like they had in recent games against Washington, UCLA and Utah the Cougars saw a late lead evaporate. Unlike those games, however, they took it back, forcing overtime when DaVonté Lacy's step-back jumper bounced off the rim and into the basket, and never trailing again.

We covered the game with this story in the paper and postgame videos of Ernie Kent and some players.

And here is our day-after post:

-- Josh Hawkinson played one of the great halves of college basketball I've seen, and it was because Ike Iroegbu played such a great half. Iroegbu, who I've been told has possibly the highest vertical jump on the team and is certainly its quickest player, jitterbugged his way through Colorado's defense over and over in the first half and when the Buffalos defenders finally caught up to him, he'd already slipped the ball to Hawkinson.

The sophomore connection was automatic and Hawkinson finished almost everything. In fact he missed just 1 of his 10 first-half attempts. The strategy worked throughout the first half, but CU adjusted at halftime and the chess match began.

In the second half Colorado began switching screens to keep the Cougars from driving, and it was a pretty effective strategy. Hawkinson was limited to just one shot attempt in the second half and it came off his own offensive rebound.

The Cougars countered by screening wings in the corners and having them curl around the perimeter for 3-pointers, occasionally having one wing make the initial action while another ran baseline and then followed the first wing off the same screen. A couple times they even had a third guard follow the shooters off the screen.

But WSU only made two second-half 3-pointers and when Que Johnson received a pass at the top of the arc he drove and was called for a charge, drawing the ire of Dexter Kernich-Drew who had flared out to the opposite wing and was wide open for an outside shot. CU's defensive adjustment ended up working and it really affected WSU's guards as Iroegbu made just 1 of 8 second-half attempts and Lacy made only 2 of 8.

-- The Cougars finished with seven Pac-12 wins and left a few more on the table by losing leads late in games. In fact, WSU has held moderate or better leads in the second halves of each of the last five games and given them up each time. WSU won two of those games but still struggled to keep their opponents underfoot, letting a 19-point second-half lead dwindle to three points at USC and letting CU retake the lead before forcing overtime and eventually winning.

Kent is taking the optimist's view that the improved Cougars are at least competitive in games that would have been sizable losses earlier in the season and says WSU is learning how to play with a lead.

"The beauty of it is, for us to have this conversation they've done a lot of growing up and a lot of things right to put themselves in position to close the game," Kent said. "And now they're still figuring that out. Remember now, this is all new to this team: the wins, this level of play, enough guys on their A-game, the shooting, the confidence, the close games."

 

Here are some notes from yesterday's game:

-- Josh Hawkinson (21 points, 10 rebounds) extended his WSU single-season record with his 19th double-double.

-- Ike Iroegbu (18 points, 11 assists) had the first double-double of his career. He also set a career-high for assists.

-- Six Cougars scored in double figures for the first time this season.

-- DaVonté Lacy scored 17 points and passed Brock Motum for fifth on WSU's all-time scoring list. Lacy has 1,539 career points, 24 points away from Don Collins (1977-80) in fourth place.

Quotes:

Lacy on Colorado's Tre'Shaun Fletcher: "We grew up in the same program and we would battle since I was in 6th grade and he was in 5th. I actually tried to recruit him here and he took a visit. We have a good relationship."

Lacy on his game-tying shot: " I don't know if that 's what (fans will) remember me for but I knew I was going to take it. Coach drew up a play and said that I had enough time to use a ball-screen and we didn't use the ball-screen and I just created."

Iroegbu on he and Hawkinson's big nights: " Coach Kent was … was like, even thought it's senior night we underclassmen have to step up and we can't let the seniors lose their last home game at Beasley. I took that to heart and just made it a point to play well for DaVonte, for Jordan and for Dex. "

Hawkinson on Askia Booker's three-quarter court heave to end regulation: "I honestly thought it was going in. I definitely did not want it to end like that, especially for the seniors. I thought it was good and I'm glad it wasn’t."

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