As is often said, basketball is a game of runs. There's definitely a psychological element to runs, whether or not you want to call it "momentum".
It's why coaches will call time outs to resettle their team and make adjustments to try to stop a run, or why a certain lineup might be left on longer than planned if they were on a run.
It's a double-edged sword, though. While on the receiving end of a run, you may get sped up, make poorer decisions, try to force things, lose focus, etc... which can lead to missed shots, turnovers, etc. When on a run, though, riding the high of concurrent successes, sometimes players take "heat check" shots or overcommit to a steal or otherwise step outside of the type of play that had led to success.
A time out creates a psychological break/restart and helps to refocus a team that had been on its heels - and a technical foul is just a free time out.
In this case, instead of it being an immediate MD inbound under the basket with a very short play clock after just being stuffed - they got a break in the action for Willard to settle them down, then got the ball back up 1 more point, with a reset clock.
As has been said - would it have changed the outcome? Likely not the way we'd been playing, because runs don't last forever, and your opponent will also have their opportunity for their own runs. And a stop and a score to bring Rutgers within 8 would have likely forced a Willard timeout, anyway.