Two Elijah Hawkins free throws with five seconds remaining and a contested miss by the home team at the buzzer gave visiting Minnesota a 73-72 win over Butler in the opening round of the 2024 NIT.
 
The game was played Tuesday night at Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis.
 
With the win, Minnesota improves to 19-14 on the season and will play the winner of Wednesday night's game between Indiana State and SMU in the second round. The loss ends Butler's season at 18-15.
 
HOW IT TRANSPIRED:

• An early 11-0 run by Minnesota gave the visitors a 19-11 advantage at the 10:25 mark of the first half.
• Butler would fight back with a run of their own to knot the game at 23-23 less than five minutes later.
• A stretch of eight consecutive made field goals gave the Bulldogs a 38-34 lead with less than a minute remaining in the first half before Butler went into the locker room with a 38-36 advantage.
• Butler's largest lead of the game came at 51-44 with 14:41 remaining, following six straight Bulldog point points.
• Minnesota quickly erased that lead and took at 54-53 lead.
• One more time the Bulldogs found a spurt on back-to-back three-pointers from Pierre Brooks II and Jahmyl Telfort to push Butler's edge to 60-54 with 8:12 to play.
• After ties at 60-60 and 67-67, Butler was able to find a 72-69 lead on Telfort's runner in the lane with 39 seconds to play.
• A Dawson Garcia bucket and those two Hawkins free throws sandwiched around a Butler turnover gave Minnesota the final 73-72 margin.

 
OF NOTE:

• Telfort led Butler with 25 points, his fifth 20-point game of the season and one point shy of his season-high.
• DJ Davis and Posh Alexander each added 13 points for Butler.
• Davis had a career-high seven assists.
• Alexander had four steals Tuesday night, moving him to 71 for the season. That mark is third in Butler single-season history.
• Garcia led Minnesota with 25 points.
• Hawkins scored 11 points to go along with 15 assists.
• Minnesota put five players in double figures.
• Both teams shot 47 percent.
• The game featured 11 ties and eight lead changes.