Cougars regain their shooting touch with outside barrage

Never underestimate the power of the 3-ball.

It giveth and it taketh away.

In BYU's 83-66 win over New Mexico on Saturday, slumping BYU shooters found their range and it proved a radioactive death for the Lobos.

Nobody was more in tune than sophomore archer Jonathan Tavernari. When the Brazilian turned on the switch against New Mexico, like he did earlier this season against Louisville, the Cougars didn't just catch fire; it was instantaneous combustion.

Since a loss to Wake Forest in North Carolina, the Cougars had been in a shooting funk, hovering around 33 percent from the field. Their 3-point shooting had all but abandoned them in games at UNLV, Utah, and even at home against San Diego State.

It was like watching a peg-legged, patch-wearing pirate thread a needle from a pitching ship's deck. They shot rim-outs, clanked shots off the front of the rim, missed the iron completely and branded some air balls.

Tavernari was the worst. Before Saturday, he shot .076 (1-for-13) from beyond the arc the past three games and 17 percent (5-for-29) overall from the field. Cold? Tavernari was meat-locker frozen. If he blinked, he'd have broken his eyelashes.

But Saturday, Tavernari's shot looked like something you'd see on posters and highlight films. Perfect rotation, beautiful spin, a net-snapping wonder. Tavernari buried his first shot attempt, a fake and dribble floater on the move. He then proceeded to go 5-for-5 and, like sheep in a chute to a loading truck, the rest of the team followed.

Slump over.

New Mexico done.

Actually the Lobos, the league's top scoring team, looked finished about nine minutes after tipoff due to this BYU shooting renaissance.

Shooters? Well, they feast or do the famine thing, and Tavernari might just one of those shooters whose depth of his shooting conscious knows no bounds. He really believes he can make any shot — even from a worm hole from the deck of the Enterprise.

On Saturday, Tavernari was definitely the fuse.

If you'd sit courtside or witness it on TV and watched the 6-6 forward and the rest of the Cougars struggle with their shooting, you could understand how woefully bad the Cougars had been misfiring. Conversely, you could see how quick Tavernari's shooting elevated his mates in this game.

Sam Burgess went off, scoring 15, with a perfect 3-of-3 from outside.