Tulane University
NIT First Round vs. N.C. State
Men's Hoops Falls To N.C. State, 64-60
Mar 14, 2000 | Men's Basketball
March 14, 2000
By DAVID DROSCHAK
AP Sports Writer
RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - Damien Wilkins scored 18 points and North Carolina State got two clutch baskets over the final 2:27 with the shot clock winding down en route to a 64-60 victory over Tulane in the NIT on Tuesday night.
The Wolfpack (18-12) won its first-round game in the tourney for the fourth straight season and will take on the winner of New Mexico State-Arizona State game on Wednesday night.
Tulane closed its season at 20-11, losing for only the third time in 11 games decided by five points or less.
N.C. State avenged a 73-62 loss to the Green Wave on Dec. 22, a defeat that ended the Wolfpack's 7-0 start and knocked them out of the national rankings.
Neither team led by more than six points and the score was tied six times in the second half until Tim Wells, making his first start this season, sank his third 3-pointer of the game with 8:03 left to give the Wolfpack a 52-45 lead.
Tulane closed to 57-56 with 3:54 left before Ron Kelly sank a shot in the lane with one second on the shot clock. Archie Miller followed suit with a 3-pointer a little more than a minute later as the shot clock hit zero.
The Wolfpack made it close by missing five of seven free throws over the final 30.5 seconds.
Tulane's leading scorer, Sterling Davis, picked up two fouls seven minutes into the game and went scoreless while spending most of the first half on the bench. He finished with 11 points.
Neither team led by more than six points in the first period dominated by Wilkins, who scored 13 of his team's 26 points.
The Green Wave, a combined 16-for-79 from 3-point range in its last five games, struggled from beyond the arc again, going 0-for-7 in the opening 20 minutes before heading inside more in the second half of the brutally physical game.
