It was nearly a Hollywood ending for the South Dakota men’s basketball team but fell 85-82 Tuesday night to UCLA inside Pauley Pavilion.
Trailing by 24 points with 5:01 remaining in the game, South Dakota tallied 14-straight points to pull within 10 points with just under two minutes remaining. The run included dunks from Tyler Peterson and Dan Jech and concluded with a layup from Nick Fuller to bring the score to 78-68 with 1:55 showing on the clock.
Aaron Holiday hit a pair of free throws for UCLA to increase the lead back to 12 points but was quickly erased by back-to-back 3-point baskets from Brandon Armstrong. Holiday sank three more shots from the charity stripe; with the last one coming with 42 seconds on the clock to give UCLA an 83-74 lead.
On the following USD possession, Armstrong was fouled on a 3-point attempt and calmly went to the free throw line making all three shots, pulling USD within five points. Tyler Peterson then had a steal on the inbounds pass and scored on a layup as the comeback was looking more and more probable with 24 seconds remaining in the game and the Coyotes trailing by four at 83-79.
Needing to foul, the Coyotes sent Jaylen Hands to the free throw line where he hit 1-of-2 free throws to push the lead to five points with eight seconds remaining. South Dakota, out of timeouts, quickly pushed the ball up the floor where Armstrong hit his third trey of the game with three seconds remaining.
South Dakota sent Hands to the charity stripe again, where he replicated his last trip making 1-of-2, giving UCLA a three-point advantage with 1.5 seconds on the clock. However, South Dakota was unable to get a shot off leading to the final score of 85-82.
