Butler had multiple opportunities to win against Providence on Wednesday night.
Playing at Amica Mutual Pavilion in Rhode Island, Butler held a slim lead for most of the game; Providence stayed within one or two possessions, but the Bulldogs had an answer nearly every time.
Until the final seconds of regulation.
Butler and Providence were tied with 1.3 seconds left, and Finley Bizjack just got fouled under the basket. Bizjack, who was a perfect 12 of 12 from the free-throw line, stepped up to the foul line for a chance to win the game.
Then, for the first time the entire night, Bizjack missed a free throw. Then, he missed another.
And Butler and Providence went to overtime.
“It’s funny, you know, that stuff happens,” coach Thad Matta said of Bizjack’s missed free throws after the 97-87 double-overtime loss. “By no means, obviously, did that cost us the game. We had other plays we needed to make along the way. But I felt great with him going to the line, it’s just one of those things that happens.”
Butler ended up missing five free throws in a row between the end of regulation and beginning of overtime: Bizjack missed two, then Michael Ajayi missed two, and Drayton Jones missed his first of two halfway through the first overtime period.
Still, a second opportunity to win the game at the free-throw line came at the end of the first overtime, when Ajayi stepped up to the line with Butler down one with six seconds left.
He missed the first and made the second, sending Butler to a second overtime — one where they eventually ran out of gas.
“You want to be in those situations, and we just came up short,” Matta said. “We still had five more minutes each time to try to win the game. I thought we wore down a little bit at the end, but like you said, we put ourselves in a pretty good position to win. We just didn’t get the job done.”
Butler was working with a skeleton crew throughout the second overtime — Azavier Robinson was out for the game with a wrist injury, Efeosa Oliogu-Elabor fouled out in the first overtime, and Ajayi, Jamie Kaiser Jr. and Evan Haywood all fouled out in the second overtime.
Bizjack played 49 minutes and had 30 points on 7-of-17 shooting, but Ajayi was the only other player who broke double digits with 20.
“We were winded, we were gassed,” Matta said of the second overtime period. “A couple of those guys (on Providence) just had another gear … they made the big plays.”
Butler has now lost three straight after a three-game winning streak in January. The Bulldogs have a short turnaround before heading to Milwaukee to play Marquette (8-15, 3-9 Big East) on Saturday in hopes they can break this streak.
“We get home at three in the morning here, and Friday we leave at 1,” Matta said. “So, we have to teach from this game, and we have to get back. Good thing is we played them not too long ago, so the familiarity with the prep and everything shouldn’t be that difficult.”
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Free throws were costly, ‘that stuff happens,’ but Butler had chances in loss at Providence
Reporting by Chloe Peterson, Indianapolis Star / Indianapolis Star
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
