STANFORD, Calif. – The BYU men's basketball team fell 86-83 to Stanford in the first round of the NIT Wednesday night at Maples Pavilion. The Cougars end the 2017-18 season with a 24-11 record.
"I'm a little disappointed because we wanted to move on and keep playing in this tournament," BYU head coach Dave Rose said. "There comes a time where you lose a game and then there are no games left. The message this year is this team found a really unique way to stay together and overcome a lot of things this season."
Elijah Bryant led all scorers with 28 points while tallying 10 rebounds and two assists. Jahshire Hardnett added 12 points, four rebounds, three assists and two steals. Yoeli Childs recorded a double-double with 11 points and 10 rebounds and TJ Haws contributed 10 points, three assists, two rebounds, one steal and one block.
The Cougars got on the board first with a dunk by Bryant and was followed by a Childs layup to take an early 4-0 lead two minutes into the game. Stanford answered with an 8-0 run to take an 8-4 advantage with 6:50 remaining in the first quarter.
With the Cardinal on top 13-8, BYU answered with buckets by three different players to take back the lead, 15-13 with 3:13 on the clock.
The Cougars ended the first quarter on top, 18-16 after Bryant hit his second 3-pointer of the night.
In the second quarter, layups by Dastrup and Childs extended the BYU lead to 22-16 with 8:21 left on the clock.
The Cardinal regained the lead after a 9-0 run for a two-point lead, 26-24 with five minutes before halftime.
A 10-0 run by the Cougars, including five points by Rylan Bergersen, gave BYU it's largest lead of the night, 39-30 with 1:41 on the clock.
At halftime, the Cougars were on top 39-35. BYU shot 48.5 percent from the field and 33.3 percent from beyond the arc. Stanford shot 46.4 percent from the field and 35.7 percent from the 3-point line. Defensively, the Cougars forced 13 turnovers.
Seven-straight points by the Cardinal put Stanford on top 42-39 early in the third quarter. Despite buckets by BYU to slow down the Cardinal offense, the Cougars were unable to take back their lead.
Another 7-0 run by Stanford at the end of the quarter extended the margin to 61-52 as the buzzer sounded to send the game into the final quarter.
BYU scored the first two buckets of the fourth quarter, but a 9-2 run by the Cardinal extended the lead to 14-points, 72-58 with 6:13 left in the game.
The Cougars did not back down as they answered with 10 consecutive points that ended with back-to-back layups by Hardnett to make it a two possession game, 72-68, with three minutes to go.
In the final 30 seconds of the game, Bryant scored 8-of-10 BYU points to make it a one possession game, 85-83. Stanford went 1-of-2 from the line to keep it a 3-point game. The Cardinal held on to take the 86-83 victory.
The Cougars shot 44.7 percent from the field, 22.2 percent from three and 60.0 percent from the charity stripe. Stanford shot 44.8 percent from the field, 31.8 percent from beyond the arc and 59.4 percent from the free-throw line.