Conference USA - Championship Game

(7) Houston 81, (1) UTEP 73

The BOK Center in Tulsa continued to be the epicenter of March Madness, as Houston shocked top-ranked UTEP to claim the Conference USA title and automatic bid.  The Cougars’ charmed sprint to the C-USA title consisted of four consecutive wins in four straight days; impressive stuff for a team that had been 4-6 in its final 10 games leading to the C-USA tourney.  Although Houston coach Tom Penders has a penchant for getting teams into the Big Dance – the Cougars are the fourth team he's taking to the Big Dance - nobody thought he would be taking the 2009-10 edition of the Houston Cougars dancing.  And yet, that's exactly what they're going to be doing either Thursday or Friday of next week.

The Big Picture: While the C-USA tourney had unofficially become the Aubrey Coleman show, his backcourt sidekick Kelvin Lewis stole the spotlight today.  Much like Iron Fist coming to the rescue of Powerman, Lewis bailed out his pardner, who had his worst game of the C-USA tourney today, scoring only 13 points on 4-of-20 shooting from the floor.  No matter – Lewis picked up the slack, draining 6 triples on his way to scoring a game-high 28 points.  It was a Lewis 3-pointer with 3:14 to play that staked the Cougars to a 71-70 lead, which they never relinquished.

Lest we give Lewis all the credit, even though Aubrey Coleman didn't light up the Miners, he still played pretty well.  As he has all tournament, Coleman treated the rock like he was Gollum looking after his “precious,” turning it over but twice against an active and quick UTEP backcourt.  Coleman also dished out 6 dimes, a few of which were to his backcourt mate Lewis.  More importantly, it was Coleman who plunged the dagger into UTEP, turning a theft into a fast-break layup that put the Cougars up 76-72 with less than a minute to play.

The Good: A lot can be made about the play of Coleman, and the speed metal tempo at which Houston prefers to play, but the fact is Houston won the C-USA Tournament because the Cougars valued the ball.  In today's title tilt, Houston turned the rock over a mere eight times against a UTEP team that is one of the best in the NCAA in forcing turnovers.  This was just the continuation of a season-long trend for the Cougars, who have been among the leaders in turnover margin all season and ranked second in fewest turnovers per game, but they were even better in the C-USA Tournament.  The Cougars had 2, 7, 6, and 8 turnovers in their four tournament games in Tulsa.

The Bad: UTEP became the latest team to join in this postseason's worst fad: inexplicable and unconscionable chucking away from three-point range.  Why a team with skilled bigs like 6-9 Derrick Caracter and 6-11 Arnett Moultrie would keep on shooting threes when they weren't making them is vexing.  Guard Randy Culpepper, who otherwise had a terrific C-USA Tournament, was the main culprit, going 1-of-7 from three. For the game, the Miners made but 4-of-16 triples, including a ghastly 1-of-8 in the crucial and decisive second half. 

The Ugly:   Although attendance was officially listed at 8,476 for today's final, it seemed to be significantly less than that.  In general, attendance at the BOK Center wasn't as good as one might have expected given the quality of Conference USA this season.  Even if there were 8,476 at the BOK Center today, the building certainly didn't have the energy of the Richmond Coliseum during the CAA final or of Arch Madness at the Scottrade Center in St. Louis.