DePaul drops record 24th straight in Big East

DePaul set the Big East record Tuesday night for most consecutive losses to conference foes.

But the way the Blue Demons rallied from a deep deficit suggests their unhappy run won't last much longer.

DePaul slashed a 17-point second-half margin to 3, but Jimmy Drew's harried 3-pointer at the buzzer rolled out and Cincinnati escaped with a 71-68 Big East victory at Allstate Arena.

“It was just a bang-bang play that we drew up at the timeout,” Drew said of DePaul's inbounds play that began with four-tenths of a second left. “I just kind of screened and slipped open. Got a little bit of an open look. Just didn't fall.”

The drained Blue Demons (6-17, 0-11) looked disheartened after dropping their 24th straight against Big East teams — and 11th overall — but they might have felt worse had Drew's shot gone through.

Though the officials signaled Drew's shot would have counted, the director in ESPN2's production truck said replays indicated Drew let it go too late — and the rules require officials to consult the courtside monitor on all half-ending buzzer-beaters.

Either way, DePaul settled for another confidence builder instead of a “W.”

Freshmen Cleveland Melvin (20 points), Brandon Young (16) and Moses Morgan (career-high 13) enjoyed their best collective scoring effort Tuesday.

“It's definitely tough,” Drew said. “You lose by 4 (Saturday at Louisville) and by 3 in games that we feel we definitely should have won. But you kind of need to look at it as a positive — that we're making strides in the right direction.”

DePaul marched backward in the first half as Cincinnati (19-5, 6-5) shot 58 percent to take a 41-26 lead at the break.

Among the issues? Young, the Demons' point guard, ran afoul of coach Oliver Purnell's game plan and spent 10 minutes on the bench.

“If you're not adjusting to instructions and changing, then come over and sit and watch like we watch it and maybe you can figure it out,” Purnell said. “He played much better (in the second half). Just being more of a leader. More of a director out there. Defending better.”

That went for everybody in a DePaul jersey after halftime.

After Cincinnati stretched its lead to 49-32 with 15:58 to go, DePaul's full-court pressure finally started to take effect after several easy Bearcats layups and dunks.

Between the turnovers and the unprecedented 3-point shooting — DePaul hit 6 of 8 3s before Drew's buzzer-beating miss — the Blue Demons gradually reeled in the visitors.

Morgan's 4-point play with 1:34 to go cut the margin to 69-65, but the Demons failed to score on their next three possessions.

Young's 3-pointer with four-tenths of a second left seemed to be too little, too late, but then the Bearcats' Rashad Bishop threw a long inbounds pass out of bounds to give DePaul a chance to set up Drew's shot.

“I really did think it was going in,” Drew said.