SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — The Coliseo de Puerto Rico is a state-of-the-art basketball facility, but that isn’t where Arkansas held three practices between Friday night’s 16-point loss to Providence and Sunday’s game against Virginia Commonwealth.

Instead Coach John Pelphrey found a local gym that wasn’t air-conditioned.

“It was like 100 degrees in the gym,” Arkansas senior forward Sonny Weems said. “So you didn’t want to bear-crawl the whole court after a turnover.”

The extra practice time and punishment for committing turnovers paid off for the No. 18 Razorbacks, who looked much sharper in beating VCU 70-60 to take third place in the Puerto Rico Tipoff Tournament.

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Arkansas (3-1 ) had 17 turnovers against the Rams — who pressed the entire game — after tying a school-record with 32 in a 67-51 loss to Providence and having 26 in Thursday night’s 75-49 victory over Charleston.

“I’m proud of our guys for bouncing back,” Pelphrey said. “I thought there was a much better respect level for taking care of the basketball, for doing the right things vs. pressure.

“ We did a better job of simply catching the ball, facing up, and then attacking.”

Weems, who led Arkansas with 16 points, 8 rebounds and 3 assists in 37 minutes, said there was no talking on the team bus after the Providence game.

“There was no talking anywhere Coach was around,” Weems added. “We really wanted to come out and get this win [Sunday night ], not for ourselves, but for Coach and for the fans back home.”

Razorbacks sophomore guard Patrick Beverley said the players understood why they had to practice twice in a sweltering gym Saturday rather than spend the day having fun with their family members who also made the trip.

“It showed that after a bad loss, there are going to be severe consequences,” said Beverley, who had 13 points “If you’re going to turn it over 32 times, you have to tune up things.

“ We’re here to win games. That’s the biggest thing.”

The Razorbacks played aggressively, but were under control for most of the game.

“I thought they attacked our pressure intelligently,” VCU Coach Anthony Grant said. “They took advantage of some opportunities to get to the rim and get easy baskets when they were there.

“ When they weren’t there, they pulled it out and made good decisions.”

Arkansas’ guards also did a good job of getting the ball inside, where the Razorback outscored the Rams 28-12 in the paint, including 10 points by 6-10 senior forward Darian Townes.

Senior point guard Gary Ervin was replaced in the starting lineup by sophomore Stefan Welsh, but responded well and finished with 12 points and 1 assist with 1 turnover in 26 minutes.

“I thought Gary was outstanding,” Pelphrey said. “I thought he played like a senior.”

Arkansas jumped to a 24-9 lead the first 12 minutes. VCU (2-2 ) trailed the rest of the game, but twice pulled within six points in the final 3: 45.

Each time the Razorbacks answered, first on an 18-foot jumper by Ervin and then with two free throws by Beverley.

“Down the stretch, we continued to make plays,” Pelphrey said. “The game was always in jeopardy and we kept playing.”

VCU, led by senior forward Michael Anderson (16 points ) and junior guard Eric Minor (12 points ), shot 33. 3 percent from the field. The Rams didn’t force enough turnovers that led to easy baskets and struggled inside against the bigger Razorbacks.

“The best thing for us — outside of not turning it over as much, which was the biggest key — is we were committed to playing defense,” Pelphrey said. “Seventeen [turnovers ] is still too much, but it’s a lot better than 32.”

Grant is in his second year at VCU after being a Florida assistant coach for 10 seasons, so he’s familiar with many of the Razorbacks.

“They’re extremely talented from top to bottom,” Grant said. “They have the potential to be a dominant team.”

Pelphrey said he was pleased with how the Razorbacks responded to being challenged after the Providence loss.

“Our attitude was terrific,” Pelphrey said. “No matter what went on in the game, our faces didn’t change and we kept trying to play.

“ If you have a bad moment, you get frustrated and the team separates and divides, that team we played would have chewed our ears off.”