BYU men's basketball: Timely trey helps BYU set record

FORT WORTH, Texas — Lee Cummard refused to let TCU end BYU's regular season with a big "oops" on Saturday night.

Instead, the junior forward canned two buckets in the final four minutes to lift the No. 24-ranked Cougars to a 61-54 win over the Frogs in Daniel-Meyer Coliseum, ending BYU's regular season with a little more juice heading into Las Vegas.

"Huge, just huge shots from the league's MVP," said Cougar sophomore Jonathan Tavernari, who led the Cougars with 17 points. Cummard, who had eight rebounds, scored 16.

The win lifted the Cougars to its best regular season record ever, 25-6, and set a new standard in the Mountain West for league wins at 14. TCU dropped to 14-15 and 6-10.

The No. 1-seeded Cougars now get the winner of Wednesday's Mountain West Tournament play-in game between Wyoming and Colorado State. BYU's next game tips off Thursday at noon in the Thomas & Mack Center at Las Vegas .

"I'm proud of the way our guys handled a very emotional week with a final win at home and regular-season championship," said Rose. "For nine or 10 minutes of the second half, we were off and struggled, nothing was working, but our defense continued to keep us going."

The Cougars raced to a 32-22 lead on long-range shots by Sam Burgess and Tavernari and created havoc for the Frogs on defense, keeping TCU from making a field goal for more than eight minutes in the first half. Trent Plaisted (nine points, six rebounds) got two quick fouls and sat out almost half of the first 20 minutes. That placed a premium on BYU's outside shooters and transition game to carry the offense.

And that faded, only to return when it counted.

BYU then struggled to score in the second half and TCU used its rebounding advantage and three quick steals to rip off a 9-0 run. TCU took a 46-44 lead with 9:15 to play on a 3-point make by Keion Mitchem, and the Cougars were in a real dogfight.

BYU made seven 3-pointers in the first half but went 0-5 from that range after intermission until Cummard's big 3-ball.

"It was frustrating," said Tavernari, who hit 6 of his 15 shots on the night, including 2-of-7 from beyond the arc. "We're a team used to scoring in the 70s and 80s, not 60s."

After TCU tied the game at 43, Cummard, Burgess, Plaisted and Ben Murdock combined to make 6-of-8 free throws to etch BYU out a 50-47 advantage at the 5:06 mark — and to set up Cummard's heroic, killer 3-point shot.