Butler stuns top-ranked Indiana in overtime

INDIANAPOLIS -- Indiana hoop dreams don't get much better than this.

Walk-on Alex Barlow's bucket with 2.3 seconds left gave Butler an 88-86 win over No. 1 Indiana on Saturday in the Crossroads Classic.

Barlow, a sophomore, had scored 18 points in his career before Saturday's game. He drove to the hoop, then posted up, spun and flipped the game winner up from inside the paint to help the Bulldogs claim their first-ever win over a top-ranked team.

"I was looking for options and they weren't open," Barlow said. "I saw the clock get to about six, so I decided to make a play. I like to get to my right hand, so I made a little spin move. The floater is a shot I work on a lot, and I happened to get a lucky bounce."

Rotnei Clarke scored 19 points, Roosevelt Jones had 16 points, 12 rebounds and seven assists and Andrew Smith added 12 points and nine rebounds for the Bulldogs (8-2). It was Butler's fifth straight win.

The Bulldogs won after Jones and Smith fouled out in regulation and key reserve Erik Fromm fouled out in the extra period.

"Such a gutty effort from our guys," Butler coach Brad Stevens said.

Indiana's players and coaches said they made mistakes, but they gave Butler credit for making plays.

"They executed down the stretch, that's why they won," Indiana's Victor Oladipo said. "It's that simple."

Jones wasn't making a big deal about the win.

"We already know how good we are and how good we can be," he said. "We just want to go to the next game and prepare for Evansville and get ready to play hard against them."

Oladipo and Cody Zeller each scored 18 points for Indiana (9-1). The Hoosiers were outrebounded 40-38 and outscored 33-15 from 3-point range. Clarke made 5 of 11 3's and Stigall and Fromm each made two.

Zeller scored four straight points in overtime to give Indiana an 84-80 lead, but Clarke and Stigall hit back-to-back 3's to give Butler an 86-84 lead with 58.6 seconds left. Zeller came back with a layup to tie the score with 19.3 seconds to go.

Barlow posted up and scored over Jordan Hulls in the paint to give Butler an 88-86 lead late in overtime, and Hulls missed a long shot at the buzzer.

"We cost ourselves at the end of the game defensively," Indiana coach Tom Crean said. "They made the plays, there's no question about that, but we made the mistakes on how we guarded them."

Indiana led 37-33 at halftime, but Butler opened the second half with a baseline fadeaway by Khyle Marshall that cut Indiana's lead to 37-35. Indiana quickly responded, and a steal and dunk by Oladipo made it 42-35 and forced Butler to call a timeout.

The Bulldogs rallied, and a 3-pointer and layup by Clarke helped Butler cut Indiana's lead to 47-46.

Butler's Jones and Smith, who had left the game with four fouls, re-entered with nine minutes remaining and the Bulldogs trailing 57-50.

Clarke's pull-up 3-pointer trimmed Indiana's lead to 57-54, and Kellen Dunham's 3-pointer gave Butler the lead. A layup by Smith pushed the Bulldogs' lead to 63-59 and a 3-pointer by Stigall bumped the advantage to 66-59.

Jones fouled out with 2:03 remaining and the Bulldogs ahead 71-64, and Smith fouled out with 1:46 to go. Indiana took advantage, and a free throw by Remy Abell cut Butler's lead to 71-69.

Butler took a 76-73 lead on two free throws by Barlow with 16.6 seconds left. Indiana freshman Kevin "Yogi" Ferrell responded with a 3-pointer to tie the score. Stigall had a chance to win it, but he missed a 3-pointer and the game went to overtime.

Butler successfully slowed the tempo early, and the Bulldogs took an early 7-4 lead on a 3-pointer by Smith. Indiana tied the game 9-9 on a layup by Oladipo, and a steal by Christian Watford led to a dunk by Oladipo to give the Hoosiers a 13-12 lead.

Butler regained the lead 19-17 on a deep 3-pointer by Clarke, who had been struggling to get open against Oladipo and Will Sheehey.

Indiana went up 22-19 on a reverse layup by Hulls, but the Bulldogs regained the lead on a putback by Smith with 4:40 left in the half.

Indiana again responded and went up 28-23 on a 3-pointer by Ferrell. The Hoosiers threatened to pull away in the closing minutes of the first half, but Erik Fromm's 3-pointer in the final seconds cut Indiana's lead to 37-33 at the break.

Butler made the necessary plays in the second half to pull through.

"Don't use this as an excuse to get down on Indiana," Stevens said. "I still think they're a team to beat in April. Our guys just played really, really hard, and it really mattered, and they figured out a way."

NOTES: Indiana beat Butler 75-59 in Bloomington last year. ... Both teams have beaten North Carolina and Ball State this season. ... Indiana's Ferrell, Zeller and Hulls and Butler's Fromm all won high school state titles at Bankers Life Fieldhouse, which then was known as Conseco Fieldhouse. Fromm and Hulls were high school teammates at Bloomington South when they won the 2009 Class 4A title. ... Indiana played its first game without reserve forward Austin Etherington, who fractured his patella against Central Connecticut State on Dec. 8.