BYU Basketball: Cougars edge Santa Clara, here's what we learned

It wasn’t pretty, but BYU Basketball beat Santa Clara on Saturday night. The Broncos entered the game winners of nine of their last eleven.

BYU Basketball held on to beat a surging Santa Clara team 80-74 on Saturday night, improving to 3-1 in West Coast Conference play. For the Broncos, it’s just their third loss in their last twelve games.

It wasn’t the prettiest of wins, and while the Cougars never trailed in the game, the never could put comfortable distance between themselves and the Broncos either.

Fortunately Yoeli Childs provided the scoring punch and TJ Haws nailed a clutch three-pointer late in the game to keep it out of Santa Clara’s reach.

Here’s what we learned from the win:

Big Childs

Childs had another monster game, scoring 26 points on 9-17 shooting. He was quiet on the boards (by his standards), grabbing just six rebounds. The big man did have three turnovers, though, and that’s become his biggest problem recently.

Haws the Handler

Since TJ Haws took over as the primary ballhandler once conference play started, he’s taken nearly two fewer shots per game (11.8 to 10.0), yet he’s scoring just a half a point less (17.1 to 16.5). He’s also increased his assists per game by a half a point (5.5 to 5.0).

On Saturday night he scored 16 points on 4-9 shooting and dished out 8 assists. His three-pointer with less than 90 seconds left in the game put the Cougars up by six points, giving them the breathing room they needed to hold on for the win.

Personal Best

Luke Worthington finished the night with a personal scoring record. The senior big man had 13 points, hitting five of his six shots and three of his four free throws.

His consistent foul trouble has been the biggest thing that’s limited his production, and it was no different on Saturday. He fouled out with a little more than three minutes left in the game on an offensive foul.

A Game of Threes

The Cougars had one of their better shooting nights from distance, hitting 42.1% of their threes (8-19), yet only had seven attempts from deep after halftime.

Santa Clara actually shot better from outside the arc than inside, knocking down 45.8% of their threes (11-24) but only 44.4% of their two-point attempts (12-27).

Kudos to BYU’s interior defense, but the perimeter defense struggled once again.

Foul Fest

Once again the referees decided that their whistles were the most important part of Saturday’s game, especially in the second half.

In all, they called 44 fouls (BYU – 20, Santa Clara – 24), and the offense flow was completely halted after halftime.

Through BYU’s first four conference games the refs are calling an average of 44.5 fouls per game. To put that in perspective, only 60 out of the 351 Division I college basketball teams average 20 fouls or more per game.

This isn’t a college basketball thing, this is a WCC thing.

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BYU Basketball: Cougars edge Santa Clara, here’s what we learned

By Shaun Gordon | Jan 13, 2019