No. 13 Missouri holds off Virginia Commonwealth

Laurence Bowers had 14 points and 11 rebounds and Phil Pressey had 11 points and eight assists, leading No. 13 Missouri to a 68-65 victory over Virginia Commonwealth Saturday in the third-place game of the Battle 4 Atlantis in the Bahamas.

Pressey gave the Tigers (5-1) the lead for good with a three-pointer with 1:17 to play. That capped a run of five straight possessions where the teams exchanged the lead.

The Rams (3-3) turned the ball over with 57 seconds left. The Tigers called a timeout with 10 seconds left on the shot clock. Pressey took the inbounds, dribbled off a few seconds then made a move to the basket where he ducked under a VCU player and hit a flip shot as the shot clock hit zero.

The Tigers lost to No. 2 Louisville in the semifinals, when they committed 23 turnovers. They had 14 against VCU. Pressey had eight turnovers against Louisville and five against the Rams.

Treveon Graham and Juvonte Reddic both had 12 points for the Rams while Rob Brandenberg added 11.

Memphis 52, N. Iowa 47: Chris Crawford and Joe Jackson, two of Memphis' better players who had been struggling, scored 18 and 15 points, respectively, and the 19th-ranked Tigers avoided losing all three games in the Battle 4 Atlantis. Memphis (3-2) was one of four ranked teams in the regular-season tournament but it was the only one not to reach the semifinals, and things didn't look so great late in the first half against the Panthers, who led 26-12 with 4:34 to play. Crawford, who had 12 rebounds, hit a three-pointer to start a 10-0 run that closed the half and Jackson ended the spurt with another three to make it 26-22.

Deon Mitchell led the Panthers (3-3) with 18 points and five assists. -- AP