TEMPE, Ariz. — Life without Trent Lockett has been tough for Arizona State. Finally winning without him on Saturday felt extra satisfying.
Carrick Felix scored 20 points and the Sun Devils overcame a career-high 34 from Washington State’s Brock Motum to beat the Cougars 71-67 on Saturday.
Chris Colvin added a career-high 16 points for the Sun Devils (7-14, 3-6 Pac 12), who had lost three in a row since Lockett — their top scorer and team leader — was sidelined with a sprained right ankle. Winning without him took a group effort.
“The extra pass, that was one thing coach stressed to us in practice, that was one thing we did in practice,” Colvin said. “So we wanted to carry it on to the game. It paid dividends for us.”
Both teams were short-handed.
The Cougars (11-10, 3-6) were without Faisal Aden, the reigning conference player of the week who was on crutches after injuring his left knee in the team’s 85-61 loss at Arizona on Thursday night.
Jordan Bachynsky added 11 points and Jonathan Gilling 10 for Arizona State. DaVonte Lacy scored 13 for the Cougars.
For the first time this season, Arizona State’s opponent had more turnovers (18) than the Sun Devils did (16).
The Sun Devils had one of their better shooting nights, making 55 percent to Washington State’s 47 percent.
“It wasn’t our offense. Our offense was fine,” Motum said. “I thought it was just our defense.”
Felix made four of six free throws in the final 17.7 seconds. The final one, with two seconds left, finally sealed the victory after Reggie Moore’s 3-pointer had cut the lead to 70-67 with 3.2 seconds to go.
With Arizona State leading 66-62, Felix stripped the ball from Motum, leading to one of two free throws by Colvin, who also scored after rebounding his own missed layup to put Arizona State ahead 66-60 with 1:14 remaining.
Arizona State coach Herb Sendek said Colvin “played arguably his best game as a Sun Devil.”
“I thought we shared the ball, moved together, played together and made each other better throughout the game,” Sendek said. “… If you go back and look in the rear view mirror we were a team that suffered from an awful lot of dribbling. I thought today it was just fun to watch.”
The Cougars fell to 0-5 on the road in the Pac-12 but are 3-1 at home.
Motum made 13 of 19 shots, 2 of 4 from 3-point range, and all six of his free throws. The junior from Brisbane, Australia made all six of his free throws, leaving him 16 of 16 at the line in the games at Arizona and Arizona State.
In Sendek’s six seasons at Arizona State, only Jerryd Bayless (39) and O.J. Mayo (38) scored more than Motum’s 34 against the Sun Devils.
“If I had zero points but the win I would be way happier than this, losing,” Motum said. “I don’t know, it’s just winning is the only thing.”
The Sun Devils made nine of their first 12 shots and led 22-15 on consecutive 3s by Felix, the second with 12:00 to go in the half.
Arizona State stretched it to 29-19 on Ruslan Pateev’s 18-footer with 8:08 left.
The Sun Devils’ comfortable advantage was short-lived. A pair of 3-pointers by Lacy capped an 11-0 run that put the Cougars up 32-31 with 4:06 left in the half. Arizona State led 37-36 at the break.
The Sun Devils slowly re-built the lead in the second half. Kyle Cain made three of four free throws, then Jonathan Gilling made two from the line, punctuating a 7-2 spurt that gave Arizona State its biggest lead 59-48 with 5:58 to play.
After Arizona made 15 of 26 3-pointers against Washington State on Thursday, Arizona State was 7 of 15 on 3s on Saturday.
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