Rice Basketball battled back twice before Jaxson Thompson delivered a half-court shot in overtime to take down SFA on the road.
An opening three from Carmelo Adkins proved to be a tone-setting shot for a Rice basketball program that had yet to truly find its shooting stroke from deep so far this season. Akins’ triple was the first of four such shots from long range the Owls downed in the first six minutes of the game, keeping pace with an equally potent SFA attack.
When the Lumberjacks’ shots started to wane, Jaxson Thompson took control. He scored seven straight points for Rice, retaking the lead midway through what had been a back-and-forth first half. From there, the Owls were able to widen the gap ever so slightly, building from a one-score edge to a nine-point advantage on Thompson’s final shot of the frame, his second three-pointer of the game to give him 16 first half points.
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Rice would push the lead to 10 in the opening minutes of the second half, but the Owls ultimately couldn’t keep the SFA offense silent for a full 40 minutes. The Lumberjacks began to close the gap, erasing it with a 7-0 run to get within one, then took the lead for the first time in the period on a free throw from Gediminas Alisas with 8:18 to go.
The game maintained a razor-thin margin from that point onward, with Thompson providing the shooting spark for the visiting Owls. He scored seven straight before a pair of clutch free throws from Jimmy Oladokun Jr. and one final defensive stand helped Rice basketball force overtime. The two teams looked to be set for a second extra period before Thompson (32 points) called game with a three-quarters-court shot at the buzzer to win.
Final Box | Rice 81, SFA 78 (OT)
Key takeaway | Still searching for top-notch shooting
Rice basketball head coach Rob Lanier mentioned the Owls’ shooting as a differentiating trait he expected this year’s squad to have compared to his first two teams on South Main. Through their first three games, it hadn’t manifested itself to the degree he might have hoped.
The Owls entered Saturday shooting 41.0 percent from the field and 31.2 percent from three. Both of those numbers were buoyed by a cakewalk season-opening win over Dallas Christian. Against D1 competition, Rice had been shooting 38.3 from the field and 30 percent from three.
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Rice shot 45.9 percent from the floor and 40.9 from three against SFA. On paper, it was a better showing, but it looked as if the Owls were on track for a much better afternoon following a furious opening burst. That great shooting day is in there somewhere. Rice basketball needs to find it if they want to contend this season, but Saturday was certainly a step in the right direction.