USC basketball team is edged by Wisconsin in third-place game in Bahamas

Chucky Hepburn capped a 17-point sport with a steal and layup with 10.5 seconds to play to safe Wisconsin’s 64-59 win over USC within the Battle for Atlantis third-place sport Friday.

The Badgers closed the sport with a 10-2 run, six factors coming from Hepburn.

Each groups had been coming off additional time losses to ranked groups within the semifinals and performed one other nail-biter. There have been seven ties and 10 lead adjustments, with USC’s largest lead being seven factors and Wisconsin’s 5.

Each groups additionally had eight-point runs, however Wisconsin’s got here throughout the final 5 minutes after Drew Peterson’s three-pointer put USC forward 57-54 with 5:42 to play. Tyler Wahl and Hepburn alternated baskets within the game-changing run because the Trojans went scoreless for 4:52 and missed eight straight photographs.

Boogie Ellis ended the drought with 50 seconds to go, and after a miss by Hepburn popping out of a timeout, Hepburn picked Peterson’s pocket close to the highest of the important thing and went down and iced the sport with a pump-fake layup.

Wahl scored 14 factors and grabbed 9 rebounds for the Badgers (5-1), who face Wake Forest on Tuesday within the Large Ten/ACC Problem. Conner Essegian had 4 three-pointers and 12 factors off the bench. Wisconsin’s three video games within the Bahamas had been determined by one, one and 5 factors.

Peterson went 5 for six behind the three-point arc and scored 17 factors and added 10 rebounds. Ellis, the highest scorer for USC (4-3) at 18.5 factors per sport, completed with 15 factors, however he had solely two within the second half. The Trojans open Pac-12 Convention play at California on Wednesday.