Koa Peat leads Arizona Wildcats past ASU in Tempe and to school-record 22-0 start

TEMPE — During Arizona's school-record 22-0 start this season, Phoenix-area native Koa Peat has proven himself a player much more demonstrative in action than in words.

"I'm just an emotional player, you know?" he said after leading Arizona to an 87-74 win at ASU on Saturday, and he probably didn't need to say much else anyway.

Peat scored 21 points on 9-for-16 shooting while hitting both 3-pointers he tried, leading a front court attack that leveled the Devils like it has so many other teams this season: In a game when UA outscored ASU 50-20 in the paint, center Motiejus Krivas had 15 points and four rebounds while backup post Tobe Awaka collected 13 rebounds and seven points.

Notably, Peat's share of the production happened just 17 days after he collected 24 points and 10 rebounds against his hometown team at McKale Center.

"Especially being a kid from here -- I live like 20 minutes away from here -- I always wanted to play here," Peat said. "I came to a lot of games here when I was younger, so it was cool to play here."

Again, though, the words were hardly necessary. Not only did Peat average 22.5 points over those two games against ASU but he also picked up five fouls on Jan. 14 and four fouls that included a technical for taunting, on Saturday.

The fouls, and especially the technical, also indicated plenty of emotion.

"Kind of went over the went over the line a little bit," Peat said of his T. "But coach knows that I've just got to be better next time, and he forgave me."

When asked before about technicals for taunting, Lloyd has consistently said he wants his players to celebrate toward teammates or UA fans and not at opposing players, since the slightest perceived taunt can draw a whistle under today's officiating standards.

It's pretty clear why: Technicals result in two fouls and a loss of possession, which can change the course of a tight game. 

This time it didn't hurt the Wildcats. After Peat was teed up, ASU's Noah Meeseun hit both ensuing free throws to cut UA's lead to 71-62 but Adrija Grbovic missed a 3-pointer on ASU's resulting possession and the Wildcats never trailed by less than nine after that.

Still, Lloyd and Peat had a conversation that Lloyd declined to share in detail.

It was "nothing crazy, just Koa is a competitive guy, and it was just to keep encouraging him to stay steady. Stay steady," Lloyd said. "That could have happened any game. Koa is just a competitive guy who always wants to do well for his team."

As it was during much of UA's 89-82 win over ASU on Jan. 14 at McKale, it was also an emotional game for just about everybody. 

During a hard-fought first half, the Wildcats trailed 14-12 after the first eight minutes, having shot just 26.7% while ASU hit 50%. UA missed 7 of 8 shots during the middle of the first half, but managed three straight baskets to take a 23-18 lead with 7:28 left in the half.

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However, ASU had two free throws from Santiago Trouet and a driving layup from Anthony Johnson tied it at 30 with 4:15 to go. Then, just before the halftime buzzer, ASU guard Noah Meeusen hit a 3-pointer that sent the teams into halftime tied at 38.

Arizona started the second half by grabbing five of seven available rebounds through the first 2:14 after halftime, going ahead 44-38 and prompting an ASU timeout.

Peat hit a 3-pointer during that run while Krivas scored inside, but Krivas picked up his third foul while contesting a shot with 15:25 to go.

However, ASU was hurt even more when guard Moe Odum was called for his fourth foul with 13:34 left. Having led ASU in the first half with 12 points and two assists, Odum sat out for nine minutes after the fourth foul.

ASU managed to cut UA’s lead to just 56-53 two minutes after Odum left the court, but the Wildcats went on a 7-0 run from there and maintained a lead of at least seven points the rest of the way.

"Bad, really bad for us," ASU coach Bobby Hurley said. "I tell you, he's got to know better. He's older player. I thought there was minimal to no contact, and in a game like this, it's borderline whether that's a foul or not, but it was his fourth foul.

"So that's really tough, because they were having a hard time with high-ball screen in the first half. They were struggling guarding that and not having him on the floor definitely hurt for that period of time."

By the time Odum returned with 4:24 to go, UA was ahead by nine -- and then by 13 after Awaka and Ivan Kharchenkov scored inside on layups. The Wildcats later took leads as high as 20 points before two 3s from Meeusen over the last minute cut the Wildcats' lead to a final 13 points.

The win moved the Wildcats to 22-0 overall, breaking the record of 21-0 set in 2013-14, and tying an overall consecutive wins streak of 22 that UA set between the 1914 and 1917 seasons. UA is also 9-0 at the halfway mark of Big 12 play, while ASU dropped to 11-11 and 2-7.

Not that Lloyd wanted to discuss any of that. It's game-to-game, the way he always put it, and in this case game-to-game-and-next game, with Arizona scheduled to host Oklahoma State on Saturday, Feb. 7, and then play at Kansas on the following Monday, Feb. 9.

"I'm the wrong guy to talk about that" 22-0 start, Lloyd said. "You guys can talk about that. (It was) 1-0. A great week. We started off with a tough win at BYU and to win two road games in a week in the Big 12 --  I don't care what your record is -- you feel good."

Photos: Arizona notches an 87-74 win to sweep Arizona State, Big 12 basketball