March 8, 2008

Fort Worth, Texas - The TCU men's basketball program dropped a 61-54 decision on Senior Night to the 24th-ranked BYU Cougars on Saturday (Mar. 8) at the Daniel-Meyer Coliseum.

With the victory, the Cougars improved to 25-6 overall and 14-2 in Mountain West Conference action while the Horned Frogs concluded their regular season with a 14-15 record and 6-10 mark in league action.

The Frogs and Cougars each netted a tightly-battled contest in the early minutes of the game as the two programs flipped-flopped control of the scoreboard for the first eight minutes of the game until BYU was able to take a three-point advantage at 12-9 following a three-pointer by Sam Burgess.

BYU held a two-possession lead on the Frogs for the next six minutes until a three-pointer by Jonathan Tavernari upped the Cougars' lead to nine points at 24-15 with 6:08 remaining before intermission.

Tavernari finished with a game-high 17 points to go along with four rebounds, two assists, two steals and one blocked shot in 34 minutes of action while Sam Burgess notched 13 points and three boards in 36 minutes of court time.

The Cougars held a 10-point lead heading into the locker rooms after Tavernari connected on his second three-pointer of the game with 1:26 remaining to give BYU a 32-22 advantage.

In the second half of action, TCU senior Brent Hackett (Fort Worth, Texas/Southwest H.S.) put the Frogs on his shoulders as he notched the first seven points of the frame on a pair of lay-ins to go along with his lone three-pointer of the evening to cut the lead to 32-29 at the 18:30 mark.

In his final game at the Daniel-Meyer Coliseum, Hackett finished with 11 points and two steals in 20 minutes of action.

The Cougars were able to increase their lead to seven points at 40-33, but senior Ryan Wall (Coppell, TX/University of New Mexico) connected on a back-to-back three-pointers to cut the scoring deficit to 40-39 with 12:42 remaining in the game.

Wall finished with a team-high 15 points on 5-of-8 shooting - including a trio of three-pointers to go along with two steals in 19 minutes of action.

The Frogs were able to grab control of the scoreboard for the first time since the early moments of the first half when John Ortiz (Cali, Colombia/Colby C.C.) grabbed his own missed shot and notched a lay-in to give the Purple and White a 41-40 lead with 12:12 remaining in the game.

With the score tied at 46-46 at the 8:01 mark - the Cougars proceeded to go on a 10-1 run over the next six minutes to increase their lead to 10 points at 57-47 with 2:41 remaining in the game. BYU was able to escape the Daniel-Meyer Coliseum with a 61-54 victory over the Purple and White.

The Frogs will be back in action at the Mountain West Conference Tournament in Las Vegas, Nev., when the seventh-seed Purple and White squares-off against the second-seed UNLV at the Thomas & Mack Center on Thursday.

Quotes from the Daniel-Meyer Coliseum
Head men's basketball coach Neil Dougherty on the performance of his senior class
"They battled and competed. I'm 99 percent sure that this is the first senior game that I've coached in and we lost. I wished we could have done something different, but I will always remember how hard they played - in particular Ryan Wall, but all of them."

Brent Hackett on coming out strong in the second half
"We wanted to take the lead down, and we just got some good shots and a couple of fast breaks and did just that. I'm happy with the performance of our team because we never quit and we fought until the end. After the performance at Air Force, we came out and wanted to prove that we are better than that team that showed up last game."

Ryan Wall on his final game at the Daniel-Meyer Coliseum
"It was Senior Night so everyone was pumped up for that. Everyone played well, and we fought and it was a good game back and forth. It would've been better if we had won, but you can't argue that we didn't do everything in our power to do that."

TCU Athletic Media Relations