The No. 25 Cougars’ undefeated record in Conference USA appeared to be in peril as Rice took a 19-point lead into halftime Sunday.
UH (24-4, 15-5 C-USA) roared back in the second half behind the play of Courtney Taylor and Brittney Scott to take overtake the Owls 74-70 at Tudor Fieldhouse.
“We decided we want the 16-0 C-USA record,” Taylor said. “We just figured we had to go out with a bang. We shouldn’t lay over and we basically took it one play at a time and got the win.”
The Owls (17-12, 9-6) controlled the tempo of the first half and limited the Cougars to 27 points. Morgan Mayse gave the UH defenders fits, pouring in 21 points on 9-of-16 shooting.
“We weren’t playing our normal style,” head coach Todd Buchanan said. “We were letting them dictate the basketball game for the entire 20 minutes. It was somewhat mind-boggling of how ugly we were playing.”
The Cougars held Mayse to 1-of-7 shooting in the second half and Taylor took over going 7-of-8 from the floor for 17 second half points.
The Cougars scored 47 points in the second half on 52 percent shooting to run away with the game.
“We realized once we were in attack mode that they couldn’t guard us,” Taylor said. “Going to the basket every time, they would either foul or we would score,” Taylor said.
The Cougars attempt for a perfect conference record continues against Tulane at 2 p.m. Saturday at Hofheinz Pavilion.