Analysis: How ailing and lethargic BYU was able to get a ‘gut-check win’ over upset-minded TCU

They say the sign of a good team is the ability to pull out wins when everything is going wrong and it just doesn’t appear to be that team’s night.

Such was the case late Wednesday night at the sold-out Marriott Center, as No. 11 BYU turned it around in the second half with a ferocious display of offensive rebounding and held off upset-minded TCU 76-70 in front of 17,983 sleepy fans to improve to 4-0 in Big 12 play.

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“This was a gut-check win for our group,” said BYU coach Kevin Young.

“Hard to believe we got out-rebounded by 17 in the second half,” said TCU coach Jamie Dixon. “… That clearly stood out. The second half, we clearly got manhandled.”

The Horned Frogs (1-3, 11-6) also got a big dose of one of the country’s best players for an eight-minute stretch at the start of the second half that won’t soon be forgotten among BYU faithful.

Said to be ill before the game and looking like a shadow of himself the first 20 minutes, superstar freshman AJ Dybantsa scored 17 of his game-high 25 points eight minutes of the second half to will the Cougars (4-0, 16-1) to their 13th straight win.

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“I thought AJ was going to die out there,” Young said.

BYU’s winning streak looked to be on its deathbed at halftime as well, with TCU taking a 36-30 lead at the break and owning a 23-21 advantage on the boards. Different story in the second half, as BYU turned 14 offensive rebounds into 13 second-chance points to take control.

TCU’s leading scorer, David Punch, was also under the weather, according to Dixon, and had just seven points after entering the game with a 14.1 average. Xavier Edmonds, a 10-point scorer, picked up the slack, scoring 19 points on 6 of 14 shooting.

Fourteen-point underdogs, TCU kept things interesting until the bitter end, but BYU’s offensive rebounding and 11-point advantage at the free-throw line was the visitors’ undoing. TCU also pushed nationally ranked Kansas and Michigan to the wire before fading at the end.

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“Woulda, coulda, shoulda,” said Dixon. “We just didn’t get it done … They have beaten some teams pretty good in this (building). … They overpowered us inside.”

As has been the case all season, BYU’s Big 3 of Dybantsa, Richie Saunders and Rob Wright III came up big, especially in the first half for Wright while Dybantsa was struggling, and in the second half for the freshman and Saunders.

Despite not scoring in the game’s final 12 minutes after his torrid stretch to start the second half, Dybantsa finished with 25 points on 8 of 22 shooting to go with six rebounds and an assist in 33 minutes. Saunders heated up after a cold start to get 18 points on 4 of 12 shooting, and hit a huge 3-pointer with 2:14 remaining to seal it.

“Just an attitude of toughness,” is how Saunders described the turnaround in the second half. “Just from the (opening) jump, it was a grind. Sometimes, there are games like this. We had to figure out a way to win. Not pretty, but we came out with the win.”

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Saunders flatly said no when it was suggested the Cougars had some sort of hangover from last Saturday’s rivalry win over Utah. The senior picked up his fourth foul with 14:30 remaining and spent a good chunk of the second half on the bench when Dybantsa was taking over.

Reserve Mihailo Boskovic also had a nice night with eight points and four rebounds in 14 minutes. He got some extended minutes because backup center Abdullah “Bido” Ahmed was out with a shoulder issue. The Serbian hit a big 3-pointer with 13:33 remaining to give BYU a 49-46 lead and the Cougars never trailed again.

“We don’t win that game without Mihailo,” Young said.

TCU came back to tie it at 63-63 with 5:42 left, but Wright got the Cougars out of a scoring drought with four straight points on a layup and two free throws. Wright finished with 15 points, six rebounds and six assists, and had just two turnovers in 39 minutes.

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“In the first half, even the (assistant) coaches were like, ‘Hey man, it’s not AJ’s night. We need Rob to get going.’ And he did in the first half,” Young said.

The Cougars’ shot selection was bad in the first half, perhaps as bad as it has been all season. In particular, Dybantsa forced some shots, something he really hasn’t done much of this year.

BYU was just 1 of 11 from deep in the first 20 minutes, as Wright hit a triple from the corner after eight straight misfires. It tied for BYU’s worst shooting half of the season, with the effort in Las Vegas against Villanova.

The Cougars finished just 5 of 24 from beyond the arc (21%) and 24 of 68 (35%) from the floor.

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Former Cougar Tanner Toolson hit a big 3-pointer in the first half, and he let the crowd know it. He finished with seven points, but was just 1 of 5 from deep.

“That’s one of my really good friends,” Saunders said of the former BYU and Utah Valley star. “He had some really good stuff in that game. Props to him for just his overall career of finding ways how to keep moving forward through setbacks and all that.”

That’s a good way to describe the way the Cougars won this one. They just persevered, got an incredible eight minutes from Dybantsa, and then dominated the glass in the second half.

So the Cougars are 4-0 in conference play for the first time since 2012-13, when they were in the WCC and beat LMU, San Francisco, Pepperdine and Santa Clara. Up next is arguably their toughest game of the season: at No. 15 Texas Tech on Saturday in Lubbock.