This game was over at the half. Yes, Xavier came back, and yes, they occasionally looked like they might make it a one possession game, but this was done with 20 minutes to go. Once again, Xavier left themselves too much to do and just didn’t have enough in the tank.
The game swung in the final five minutes of the first half. In that span Xavier went from down three to down 17. That decided the game. In that stretch Xavier simply could not get right. They turned the ball over three times, went 1-5 from the floor, and got just two stops.