No. 21 Iowa State holds off Indiana State

Indiana State coach Greg Lansing just knew his Sycamores were going to pull off the upset of No. 21 Iowa State on Thursday.

'One shot, or a charge that doesn't happen,' Lansing said. 'One of those things can win you that basketball game.'

Unfortunately for the Sycamores, Iowa State came up with that one play.

Senior guard Matt Thomas hit a 3-pointer with 58 seconds to play, and Nazareth Mitrou-Long drew a charge on one of Indiana State's final possessions to help the Cyclones pull out a 73-71 win Thursday in the Advocare Invitational at HP Field House in Orlando, Fla.

Iowa State advances to face undefeated Miami in Friday's semifinals. The Hurricanes defeated Stanford to move in the winner's side of the tournament bracket. Indiana State will take on Stanford on Friday.

The Cyclones (4-0) entered the game averaging 105.3 points per game and scored 130 points in a win over The Citadel last week, but found themselves in a low-scoring battle that went down to the wire.

Indiana State (2-2) took a 68-65 lead on T.J. Bell putback with four minutes to play.

The Sycamores held on to the lead until Iowa State senior guard Monte Morris hit a layup to tie the game at 69-69 with 1:25 to play, Mitrou-Long drew a charge on Indiana State's Brenton Scott to help seal the win.

'I'm not really into the flopping stuff, because then you get known for that,' Mitrou-Long told reporters about his key defensive play. 'I thought I took the charge. I thought it was pretty good.'

Morris finished with 20 points and nine rebounds, and Mitrou-Long added 13 points. Morris, who was coming off a triple-double in his last game, had only one assist against Indiana State, leading to the Cyclones' lowest-scoring output of the season.

'I really felt that we were going to win,' Lansing said. 'I knew we were going to win. Proud of the way the guys worked. They're all hanging their head about one thing they could have done, because one thing could have won that game.'

Sophomore guard Laquarious Paige came off the bench to score 20 points and junior guard Brenton Scott also finished with 20 points for the Sycamores.

Scott opened the scoring with a 3-pointer and the Sycamores raced out to a 24-18 lead. The margin grew to 33-24 on a layup by Paige with six minutes to left in the half before Iowa State rallied.

The Cyclones ran off 10 straight points, featuring a 3-pointer from Nick Weller-Babb and went into halftime with 41-40 lead.

Iowa State hurt itself at the foul line, connecting on only 15 of 29 free-throw attempts. The Cyclones shot just 34.2 percent from the field, but still managed to pull out the win, thanks in part, to 20 Indiana State turnovers.

Iowa State's Darrell Bowie scored 13 points and grabbed 11 rebounds for his fourth career double-double. Thomas extended his streak with at least one 3-pointer to 29 straight games.