BYU basketball: Fredette leads Cougars to MWC semifinals

LAS VEGAS — To those who wondered if BYU junior guard Jimmer Fredette would return to normal after a stomach virus set him back a couple of weeks ago, you have your answer.

With the Cougars struggling to make shots, struggling to get into a consistent offensive flow and struggling for breathing room against a persistent TCU squad, Fredette erupted for 45 points Thursday night at the Thomas & Mack Center to carry BYU to a 95-85 quarterfinal win over the Horned Frogs in the Mountain West Conference tournament.

"Jimmer is a spectacular player," teammate Noah Hartsock said. "Just by playing with him every day in practice you see that he's always ready for a big game. But he was really aggressive tonight and that's exactly what we needed."

Thirty of Fredette's 45 came in the second half after the Cougars went into the halftime break trailing 40-39. Even more surprising, 23 of the 45 came from the free-throw line as Fredette hit a tournament record 23-of-24 from the charity stripe.

"Jimmer's ability to get to the free?throw line tonight was the difference in the game," BYU coach Dave Rose said.

The Cougars pulled away by scoring 56 second-half points. So what ignited BYU and Fredette in the second half?

"Just trying to go out and be aggressive, as we knew they were going to fight till the end," Fredette said.

After heading into the locker room behind by a point, the Cougars went on a 9-1 run four minutes into the second half to vault ahead 56-51. But when TCU's Greg Hills sandwiched a Fredette trey with a 2-and-1 and then a rare 3-and-1, the Horned Frogs were back to within a point at 59-58.

"They were supposed to come out with some vengeance like that (after BYU beat the Horned Frogs by 30 last Saturday) so we figured they would," Cougar sophomore Michael Loyd Jr. said. "We just didn't weather it like we should have."

However, when Jackson Emery (15 points) drilled a three, his fourth of the game, and Loyd stole the ball near midcourt and raced in for a break-away dunk, it was the beginning of an 11-2 run that finally gave the Cougars some breathing room with a 71-60 lead.

The Horned Frogs, as they did all night, came back again when Ronnie Moss scored five straight. Fortunately for the Cougars, Fredette wasn't done with his show and hit a running bank shot and driving layup to begin an 8-0 run that pushed BYU's margin to 79-65 with seven minutes remaining. Any hope the Horned Frogs had remaining was dashed when Jonathan Tavernari drilled a three and Fredette converted a 2-and-1 three minutes later.

"We finally started to play the way we have to get us this far, and that's when we finally came through," Loyd said.