Sunday, March 6, 2011

VIDEO: San Francisco has their Chris Webber moment

Gonzaga held on to beat San Francisco in the WCC semifinals on Sunday night, setting up a dream matchup against St. Mary's Monday in Las Vegas.

Both the Zags and the Gaels are sitting squarely on the NCAA Tournament's bubble. And depending on who you ask, Gonzaga is in better shape than St. Mary's, St. Mary's is in better shape than Gonzaga, or this game is, for all intents and purposes, a play-in game.

So yeah, high drama at its finest.

But if it wasn't for Marko Petrovic ... err, Rex Walters? ... that outcome could have been very different. USF hit a three to cut the Gonzaga lead, that was double digits at one point, down to 68-65 with 10 seconds left. The Dons stole to ensuing inbounds pass, and while Rashad Green was on the floor with possession of the loose ball, Petrovic can clearly be seen calling a timeout on the bench (he is number 10):



(h/t to @bubbaprog for the video)

The problem?

San Francisco didn't have any timeouts left. They were called for a technical foul and after Marquise Carter hit one of two from the free throw line before the Zags got the ball back. Instead of having a chance to force overtime, USF was down two possessions and had to force another turnover.

To his credit, San Francisco head coach Rex Walters took the blame for the timeout.

"You can call me a liar because I'm going to say that I called the timeout," Walters said after the game. "I'm not going to put it on one of my players. I have to do better job at making sure it’s really clear to our guys that we don't have any. I thought Rashad (Green) made a heck of a play to get the ball."

That's what you want a coach to do.

Or maybe but let his team know that they don't have any timeouts left.

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