Kent State ends IU\'s tourney bid

SAN DIEGO -- Emotions ran high in IU\'s locker room after its first round game against Kent State Thursday.\nBut they weren\'t positive emotions. IU lost 77-73 to a team almost everyone thought they would beat.\nKyle Hornsby almost cried. Jeffrey Newton sat in silence. Dane Fife vented to the media.\n\"Some guys just quit,\" Fife said. \"You could tell they didn\'t want to be out there.\"\nAssistant coach Julius Smith and Hornsby dismissed Fife\'s remarks as frustration and anger.\nNo. 13 Kent State came back from a 12-point deficit in the second half to upset No. 4 IU. Guard Trevor Huffman guided the comeback with a combination of cross-overs, jumpers and pinpoint passes. He finished with 24 points, 20 of which came in the second half. Most of that was while Fife was guarding him.\n\"Huffman is tough off the dribble,\" Hornsby said. \"I don\'t know how fast he is in the 100-yard dash, but he gets from zero to 100 faster than anybody I\'ve seen.\"\nJunior forward Kirk Haston led all scorers with 29 points and nine rebounds. Freshman guard A.J. Moye scored a career-high 12 points as the only other Hoosier in double-figures. Kyrem Massey scored 15 for Kent State and Mike Perry added 10 points.\nSophomore guard Tom Coverdale hit a three pointer just before halftime to give IU an eight-point lead. It swelled to 12 after a free throw by Haston with 13:41 left in the game.\nThen within three minutes Kent State was only down by two. During that stretch Huffman scored five points. But the emotional lift came from Massey who made a steal then raced down the court for a layup.\nAfter that layup, the non-IU crowd started pulling for the underdogs. More importantly though for IU, Coverdale received his fourth foul with 12:04 to go and sat down. He returned with 6:48 to go and IU up by two.\nMassey made another steal and Rashaun Warren tipped in the miss to tie the game with 6:03 to go. On Kent State\'s next possession Huffman drove past Fife and layed in a shot off the glass to give the Flashes their first lead since early in the first half.\n\"Huffman kicked me all over the court,\" Fife said.\nThe game turned decidedly in Kent State\'s favor with 4:34 left when Coverdale fouled out reaching for a loose ball. He was called for a technical foul. After the free throws, Kent State held a two-point lead.\n\"When IU lost (Coverdale) I felt that was the key because he was controlling the game,\" Kent State coach Gary Waters said.\nFreshman guard A.J. Moye tied the game with a putback with 4:18 to go.\nThat was the last time IU held a share of the lead.\n\"If Coverdale was in, we may not have won the game, but we would have played better down the stretch, and it would have been a better game,\" interim head coach Mike Davis said.\nAndrew Mitchell, who made a short jumper with 21 seconds left to give Kent State a four-point lead, threw the final dagger. On IU\'s next possession, Jeffries drove the lane but missed the layup. Haston grabbed the rebound and dribbled out to the three-point line. His shot wasn\'t even close.\nHuffman grabbed the rebound and made two free throws with eight seconds to seal Kent State\'s upset victory against IU.\nBut Kent State didn\'t see it as an upset. Massey added salt to IU\'s wounds after the game.\n\"I thought I would feel better than this after the game, but it feels just like a regular win,\" Massey said. \"Once you get used to winning, a win is a win. It\'s something you get accustomed to."