DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. — Colorado’s KJ Simpson scored 23 points and the No. 18 Buffaloes survived a tough shooting night Monday to take a 64-59 win over scrappy Richmond in the Sunshine Slam semifinals.
Tad Boyle‘s Buffs, who jumped seven spots in the AP poll released Monday, improved to 4-0 while Richmond fell to 2-2.
The Buffs will next face Florida State in Tuesday’s championship game at 2 p.m. (CBSSN) at Ocean Center.
Monday’s game, CU’s first away from home this season, wasn’t decided until the final minutes.
Colorado led for the majority of the game, jumping out to a quick 6-0 lead and taking a 28-25 edge into intermission. But the Spiders wouldn’t go away and took their second lead of the game, 44-42, with nine minutes to play.
The Buffs, though, responded with a quick 6-0 run to regain control. Richmond managed to cut the deficit to one point again before the Buffs finally put the game away. A Tristan da Silva basket with just more than a minute to play bumped CU’s edge to five and following a pair of defensive stops, Simpson, da Silva and J’Vonne Hadley each hit two free throws to give Colorado a nine-point edge, 62-53, with 32 seconds remaining.
Simpson had three rebounds and a pair of assists to go with his 23 points, bolstered by a 9-for-10 effort from the free throw line. Da Silva added 15…
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