Arizona's 81-72 victory over rival Arizona State was marred by an ugly incident in the final minute involving Sun Devils senior guard BJ Freeman headbutting to Wildcats senior guard Caleb Love.
With 46 seconds left in regulation and Arizona holding a 79-72 lead, Love blocked a 3-point shot by Freeman. Arizona sophomore guard KJ Lewis grabbed the rebound and threw the pass to Jaden Bradley on the other end of the floor for a layup to extend the lead to 81-72, giving Arizona state full control of their destiny with 39 seconds remaining.
As the Sun Devils tried to set up their offense, Freeman and Love started jawing at each other in the key. As the ball was deflected out of bounds by Arizona with 30.7 seconds left, Freeman delivered a headbutt to Love. Amazingly, officials did not call a foul on Freeman at that point. Instead, when Love got angry and threw a temper tantrum when a foul was not called, the officials ejected Love from the game.
Caleb Love has been ejected after a confrontation with Arizona State's BJ Freeman. pic.twitter.com/sQx2iMjblB
— CBS Sports College Basketball 🏀 (@CBSSportsCBB) February 1, 2025
Fortunately, the officials used replay review to make things right. After observing the clear headbutt by Freeman, he was ejected from the game as well.
Given the ugly incident, Arizona State head coach Bobby Hurley made contingency plans to avoid making a bad situation worse. Before play resumed, he sent his bench players to the locker room for the final 30.7 seconds. Hurley then sent his staff to the locker room as the clock wound down and waved to Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd indicating there would be no handshakes. Things got really awkward when a shot clock violation was called with 0.5 seconds left, forcing Hurley and the Arizona State players to stay on the court and inbound the ball one last time.
After the ejections, Arizona State HC Bobby Hurley had his players on the bench go to the locker room with 30 seconds remaining; he -- and the players on the floor -- went to the locker room right when the game ended. No handshakes.
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) February 1, 2025
Ian Eagle and Bill Raftery with the CBS call. https://t.co/adptyYKEWk pic.twitter.com/uL6aJh7wbI
Headbutting an opponent is never a good look. There is no way you can spin it in a positive light. That is a loss of emotional control. We will see if there is any additional punishment handed out to Freeman.
Love led the Wildcats with 27 points and 7 assists. Freeman led the Sun Devils with 19 points.
Moonlighting as a blogger to pursue my interest and enjoyment of sports. Former high school and Division I athlete (now a "retired" family man) that loves watching and discussing all sports. Follow me on Twitter (@HoldoutSports) and like Holdout Sports on Facebook.
