Aaron Bright thought it was one of the craziest games in which he has been involved. His performance added to the wild win for Stanford.
Bright made six 3-pointers, and Chasson Randle hit a 3 of his own with just over a minute left in overtime to put Stanford ahead to stay in a 92-88 win over Illinois State on Monday night in the NIT.
Bright finished with a career-high 29 points for the Cardinal (23-11), who erased an 11-point deficit to win for the fourth time in five games.
''It was a lot of fun,'' said Bright, who was 11 of 13 from the field, including 6 of 7 from long range. ''Jarrett Mann got me going. He got me two really good looks for 3s and I didn't have to work too hard. That got my offense going.''
Illinois State coach Tim Janovich thought Bright was the difference in the game.
''Our misfortune is Bright had a career high,'' he said. ''We couldn't get him stopped. He got into a tremendous flow.''
Added Stanford coach Johnny Dawkins: ''I thought that was Aaron's best game he's had here. I have not seen many players who played better than Aaron did tonight.''
Stanford hosts Nevada on Wednesday night, with a berth in the NIT's Final Four in New York City at stake.
Nic Moore scored a career-high 25 points for the Redbirds (21-14), who played their third consecutive overtime game. Tyler Brown added 23 points, and Jackie Carmichael had 21 points and 12 rebounds.
''They turned up the heat a little bit and put us in a different mode,'' Janovich said. ''They are good at closing gaps and rotating to the paint.''
Randle finished with 19 points and Dwight Powell added a season-high 18 points. Stanford led 41-38 at halftime.
Illinois State used a 21-5 run to erase a seven-point and take a 61-52 lead with 12:30 remaining to play. The Redbirds hit three consecutive 3-pointers during the run, two by Brown.
The Redbirds led 71-60 with 9:01 remaining, but Stanford went on a 14-3 run to tie it at 74 with 5:14 left.
The game was still tied heading into a Stanford timeout with 21 seconds remaining. Randle's shot at the buzzer hit the front rim, sending the game into overtime.
