Ball in the hands of our best player with the defense scrambling? I’ll take my chances on letting the play go without a timeout.

There was over a half court to go and 2.6 seconds. I personally thought the TO was a good move. In fact, i was thinking it should have been called earlier, but figured the delay may have been related to court position on the ensuing inbound. How much time does it take with a defender on you to drive the length of the court?

I don't think Les wanted a timeout in that situation. Johnson, for whatever reason, just called the timeout. You could see that Pepper was like "what are you doing TY?" It wasn't a good decision by TY especially since Pepper had a full head of steam and was nearly across midcourt. He would have been able to get within his 3 point range and put up a final shot. Eli was surprised by the timeout. TY thought he was doing the best thing in that situation but I'm sure Les would have preferred to let Pepper keep going and put up the final shot.

The timeout allowed Bakersfield to set up their defense and, as a result, Adebayo barely got off a contested half court shot when the inbounds pass was nearly deflected and stolen.

I agree that it would have been better to not call a timeout with 2.6 seconds left for the exact reasons you mentioned. I wonder what Coach Les told them about that situation? If you're going to call a time out, better to do it at the start of the play, not mid-court.

See: Tyus Edney vs. Missouri in the NCAA tournament in 1995. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NS8QCoYfzW8

Ty Johnson - 14 of 14 FT.

Both Pepper and TY are capable of making a play like that. TY made an amazing, acrobatic layup at the buzzer to beat Pepperdine this year.