COLUMBIA, Mizz. — Don’t call it a comeback.
Call it The Escape Job.
Will Wade guessed that LSU’s 86-80 overtime win over Missouri – featuring a 14-point comeback over the final two minutes of regulation – was a 1-in-500 proposition.
“That may be being generous,” he said.
It’s not. It’s exactly right.
According to ESPN’s game forecast, LSU (16-3, 6-0 SEC) had just a 0.2 percent chance – exactly 1 out of 500 – of coming back to beat Missouri on Saturday night in Columbia, trailing 70-56 with 2:14 left. It was, by most mathematical possibilities, over.
Skylar Mays had other ideas.
The junior ran off a 9-0 run by himself – featuring two three-pointers and a three-point play – to trim the deficit to five.
For Mays, that was the magic number.
“We were just trying to get it under five,” said Mays, who finished with 24 points to lead the way for the Tigers. “When you’re up and a team starts getting close and you’re thinking about it, we were trying to put them in that position. We tried to make them make tough choices.”
While Mays took over on offense, LSU leaned on its 1-3-1 halfcourt trap defensively to generate the necessary stops for the come-from-behind win. Wade had deployed that defense just six times prior to Saturday night’s matchup in conference play.
“We hadn’t been very good in it,” Wade said. “But we’ve been practicing it, and we had to have a change up, because they were steamrolling us on ball screens.”
Practice paid off on Saturday.
LSU outscored Missouri 27-10 over the final seven minutes of regulation and overtime, forcing 17 turnovers and turning them into 17 points.
“We cranked up our pressure, running around and scrambling,” Wade said. “When you get the game going helter-skelter like that, we’ve got good athletes. You make people make decisions under duress and at a fast pace, sometimes that happens.”
Mays wasn’t the only clutch performer in the comeback. Emmitt Williams grabbed several offensive rebounds and hit the game-tying free throw with 2.2 seconds to force overtime. Tremont Waters (13 points, 9 assists) hit a three-pointer with 1:21 left in regulation to cut the deficit to 3. Naz Reid finished with 14 points and hit all nine free throws he attempted, including four in the final seconds of both regulation and overtime.
But it was Ja’vonte Smart who delivered the daggers in overtime. The freshman guard hit a pair of deep threes to put LSU ahead and then put the game on ice. The first put LSU ahead 78-76 with 2:42 left; the second came less than a minute later, breaking a 78-all tie to give the Tigers a lead they would not surrender.
“I just fed off Skylar,” said Smart, who finished with 14 points, 6 rebounds, and 4 steals. “I was telling Coach and them, just find Skylar. I felt when I made that first one, I could go for another one, and it just went in.”
The two Baton Rouge natives proved to have nerves of steel away from home. Mays’ effort brought the team back within fighting distance, and Smart’s pushed them over the edge.
“It’s just a lot of guts,” Mays said of Smart. “That’s the type of player he is. We expect that out of him, just like he expects it out of himself. He’s coming along, and I’m just happy he’s playing so well.”
The winning feeling.
Wait for it. @EmmittWilliams6 is always a mood. @LSUBasketball pic.twitter.com/KhBYM2gyP5
— Cody Worsham (@CodyWorsham) January 27, 2019
The comeback came from an unfamiliar place for the Tigers: trailing. They’d not been behind in the second half of an SEC game for more than a few possessions all year, but they didn’t let the scoreboard keep them from losing hope – no matter how convincing it might have been.
‘It shows the guts this team has, how connected we are,” Mays said. “Playing from behind for that long isn’t easy to do. We could’ve easily wilted. We just stayed together. That’s what you have to do on the road.”
Wade was relatively calm after the game, acknowledging the mistakes his team made to fall behind in the first place. He praised Missouri’s Jordan Geist – who finished with 25 points and 11 rebounds – for his steady play. Ever fond of analogies, Wade – a high school golfer – leaned on his former sport with his team after the postgame celebration.
“It’s like I told our guys in the locker room, we’re out of mulligans after this,” Wade said. “Any deposits we’ve put in the bank with our hard work, we’ve used them all.”
If that’s true, they certainly picked the right time to use them. Those deposits – plus a junior’s will to win, a freshman’s brash confidence, a menacing 1-3-1 trap, contributions from across the board, and a heavy dose of defiant belief – paid off in historic fashion.
A win for the ages. The Miracle in Mizzou. The Comeback in Columbia.
Mays helped win it, so he can help name it.
“That was definitely an escape job,” said Mays.
The greatest of escapes.
“It’s just one of those rallies,” Wade said. “I’ve never been a part of anything like that.”