FAU hasn’t lost a game in the month of March since 2022, when the Owls lost to Northern Colorado 74-71 on Mar. 20 in the College Basketball Invitational. Since then, the team has gone 9-0 in the month of madness when they play the final stretch of regular season games and postseason play starts to ramp up.
This streak moved to 10-0 on Saturday after the Florida Atlantic University Owls (22-7, 12-4 AAC) beat the Tulane University Green Wave (13-15. 4-12 AAC) 79-73. Vlad Goldin had a team-high 21 points, 12 rebounds, three blocks along with a steal. Goldin has averaged 19.6 points and 5.6 rebounds in the last five games.
“I did what I did the last five games. Play as physical as I can, get the deepest position as I can and shoot the most valuable shot,” said Goldin. “On defense, I just trust my teammates that they’re going to get a rebound and that I’ll get a blocked shot.”
The game’s first seven minutes was a back-and-forth battle, with neither team getting a lead larger than three. Tulane took a five-point lead with 8:45 left in the first half as forward Kevin Cross threw down a dunk, but a 14-1 run by the Owls in the next four minutes gave them a 33-26 lead. FAU entered the half up seven, 36-29.
Coming out of the half, FAU jumped out to a double-digit lead in the first 80 seconds after an Alijah Martin three. Almost five minutes later, the lead jumped out to 20 after a 10-0 run in which five different players scored for FAU. The Owls led 53-33 with 13:47 left to play.
Frustrations started boiling over for the Green Wave, as Tulane guard Jaylen Forbes grabbed two fistfuls of Johnell Davis’ jersey after Davis committed a personal foul. The two spilled over into the FAU bench after some pushing and shoving, leading to refs, players, and coaches from both teams trying to break it up before the altercation got uglier. After an official review, offsetting technical fouls were assessed to Davis and Forbes.
“Our behavior is contagious, and we all have to keep our composure, stay poised, and find a way to rally around the right things instead of getting caught up in the skirmishes,” said FAU head coach Dusty May.
After back-and-forth scoring from both teams, Tulane’s efforts to chip away at FAU’s lead only amassed to the Owls holding a 10-point lead with a minute and four seconds left in the game.
However, the Green Wave didn’t go out without a fight. Intentional fouls and quick baskets by Tulane made it a five-point game with 10 seconds left. After Martin split his free throws, Forbes attempted a quick three to make it a one possession for Tulane, and he missed, securing the six point win for the Owls.
“We’re excited to escape with this win after a very choppy and interrupted game. We’ve got a very tough week coming up, and we’re excited to be where we are right now in the season with a lot of basketball left to play in the season,” said May.
With two games left in the regular season—at North Texas and at home versus Memphis—and going 2-2 in their last four games, the Owls are fighting to hold on to the second seed in the American Athletic Conference tournament, as well as an at-large bid in the NCAA tournament.
“I think if we win these next two we’ll feel better about our chances. Therefore we won’t have to play cheerleader watching Big East, Big 10 games… It’s something I try to not get distracted with,” said May.
FAU will look to stay undefeated in March since 2022 when they travel to play the University of North Texas Mean Green (15-12, 8-7 AAC) on Wednesday, Mar. 6 at 8 PM. The game will stream on ESPN +.
Recap
The game opened up with Martin taking the ball strong to the rim for a layup after Davis tracked down the opening tip. Tulane’s Cross responded with a pull-up jumper, and Goldin answered on the other end with a putback layup.
This was the routine for the game’s first seven minutes, as neither team had a significant lead with back and forth buckets. A 5-0 Tulane run capped off with Cross putting down a dunk over Goldin after an inbound play gave Tulane their largest lead for the rest of the game. FAU was one-for-eight on their last eight shot attempts.
Boyd sparked his own 6-0 run with back-to-back threes in the same corner to give FAU a 31-26 lead with 4:39 in the first half. After this, both teams spent the rest of the time scoring a combined eight points, and FAU entered halftime with a 36-29 lead.
Johnell Davis, who averages an efficient 18 points on 48% shooting and 44% from three, had four points on zero made field goals and two turnovers in the first half. He’d finish the game with five assists, four turnovers, five fouls, and eight points on 2-of-7 shooting and 0-of-3 from three.
Since FAU’s loss to UAB on Feb. 8, Davis is averaging 15 points on 37% shooting and 19% from three. Despite this, May doesn’t think anything needs to be done to get Davis out of this slump.
“I don’t know if the team needs to go into these games with a mission to get anyone out of a slump. We need to play good team basketball every possession for forty minutes,” said May. “In basketball, you turn on [the tv and see] LeBron James, Kevin Durant, not everyone plays well every night. Fortunately for us we have a really good team and we just need to focus on the group.”
Cross opened up the second half with a jumper, and Goldin responded with a layup on the other end. FAU got a stop on defense and a Martin three gave FAU their first double-digit lead of the night, 41-31, before Tulane called a timeout.
Five minutes into the second half, FAU’s offense found a groove, and they were up 20 points . However, the lead got shaved back to ten after a three by Forbes scored 56-46 with 10:53 left to play.
FAU battled to increase their lead, but Tulane kept it at 10 with 7:03 on the clock. The Owls held the ten point lead or better until a minute and three seconds was left in the game.
The game started to slow down as Tulane began fouling the Owls and scoring quickly to keep as much time on the clock as possible to attempt a comeback. Tulane’s tough defense forced FAU to call a timeout on the inbound after the Green Wave cut the lead to six.
May drew up an inbound play that had the Owls looking like football players on the line of scrimmage running routes. Brandon Weatherspoon was wide open to catch the ball. He got fouled and made both his free throws.
Tulane scored another quick bucket, and Boyd was up next to the charity stripe after an intentional foul and made both free throws. Tulane would not go away as Forbes cashed in a second-chance three-point shot with 10 seconds left.
Martin got fouled and split his free throws. Tulane threw up a quick three and missed, finally ending the game.
JD Delcastillo is the Sports Editor for the University Press. For information regarding this or other stories, email him at [email protected] or DM on Instagram @jd.delcastillo or X (Twitter) @jd_delcastillo.
