WICHITA — Kansas State basketball's alumni team had a new name, a deeper roster and, they hoped, a new lease on life in The Basketball Tournament.
Alas, it wasn't enough to get Purple Reign, formerly Purple & Black, out of the first round of the Wichita Regional on Saturday at Koch Arena.
No. 5 seed Team Colorado grabbed an early advantage in the TBT's Elam Ending and held off a Purple Reign rally to prevail, 71-67, in what was a back-and-forth game throughout.
The fourth-seeded Purple Reign had high hopes going into the 64-team, $1 million tournament after losing in the second round of the winner-take-all tournament each of the last two years and even led by six points late in the third quarter, only to see it slip away.
Entering the Elam Ending — the first team to reach the target score in the last four minutes — Team Colorado held a 62-61 advantage and needed to reach 70 points to win. Purple Reign got it tied at 64-64 on a Kamau Stokes 3-pointer, but Colorado scored the next five points to take control.
Jacob Pullen knocked down three free throws to pull Purple Reign within a basket and give his team a chance. But Colorado's Andre Roberson got to the basket for a layup to end it.
"That's the beauty of this tournament," Purple Reign coach Jordan Henriquez-Roberts said. "It's very similar to the NCAA Tournament. Nobody's safe.
"I feel like we were prepared, but to go out the way we did, we haven't lost in the first round in quite a few years, and with a lot of roster depth, too. (But) we'll be back next summer."
Pullen scored 17 points, 14 of them in the first quarter, to lead Purple Reign, with Stokes adding 14. Cartier Diarra contributed seven points and Tariq Owens five with a team-high seven rebounds.
D'Shawn Schwartz had 21 for Team Colorado, which was made up primarily of University of Colorado alumni. Michael Holyfield and Jaizee Lottie each had 10 points.
Colorado, dominated the boards on the way to a 34-29 halftime lead with 12 second-chance points to just one for Purple Reign. Holyfield led his team to a final 39-32 rebounding advantage with eight.
Colorado also outscored Purple Reign from the free-throw line, 20-14.
Pullen, who left K-State in 2011 as the school's career scoring leader, had hoped for more in his return to TBT after a year's absence. But he appreciated the large contingent of purple and lavender-clad fans who showed up to cheer the team on.
"It's always great. That's the main reason we do it," he said of the crowd support. "Come out and see the fans and give them a chance to seed guys that they haven't seen in a long time.
"It's a chance for us to reconnect the brotherhood thing and just have some fun. Unfortunately, it didn't go how we wanted, but I enjoyed being here with my guys, seeing everybody come in here."
Besides, there's always next year.
"Hopefully next year we get Barry (Brown) and everybody to come in and make it into an alumni thing," he said. "It will happen."
Arne Green is based in Salina and covers Kansas State University sports for the Gannett network. He can be reached at agreen@gannett.com or on Twitter at @arnegreen.
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