I have colleagues that cannot write about Steve Alford, now the coach at UCLA, formerly the coach at New Mexico, without mentioning that he likes to wear a basketball net as a fashion accessory. But he wasn’t the first.
NCAA Tournament
Cory Jefferson scored 16 points and No. 6 seed Baylor kept 11th-seeded Nebraska winless in its NCAA tournament history with a 74-60 second-round victory Friday. The Bears (25-11) kept up a two-month tear and will play either No. 3 seed Creighton or No. 14 seed Louisiana-Lafayette on Sunday.
Daniel Coursey scored 17 points and Mercer pulled off the biggest upset in the NCAA tournament so far by knocking off Duke 78-71 Friday.
There wasn’t enough twine in California and all neighboring states to save Steve Alford during his first news conference for the college basketball coaching job no one can ever succeed at to the level it once knew.
All it took was one game to stain millions of brackets. Aaron Craft’s potential winning layup rolled off the rim as the buzzer sounded and Ohio State went down. And that was just the beginning.
“March Madness” morphed into “The Longest Day” on Thursday, after San Diego State and New Mexico State went to overtime, marking the record fourth game of the day to extend the extra 5 minutes.
The earth’s shadow can be observed during twilight hours, assuming the sky is clear. It stretches over 180 degrees of the horizon. It’s a hefty dose of darkness. It must be how David Stockton feels some days as a point guard for Gonzaga.
Another great day of basketball is on tap. We’re going to go to San Antonio for today’s featured matchup, though.
That hangover from the Big East tournament is gone for Villanova. Darrun Hilliard scored 16 points, JayVaughn Pinkston added 13 and the Wildcats beat Milwaukee 73-53 on Thursday night in the second round of the NCAA tournament.
The shot was long, and it smacked hard off the glass in the final seconds. That’s when big Cameron Ridley, standing every bit of 6-foot-9 and 285 pounds, reached down, picked up the ball and put it in as time expired. Hello Texas, and welcome back to March Madness.
The guys in green raced off the court and into the locker room where they danced and sang, compared whose shot was most likely to end up featured on “One Shining Moment,” and checked Twitter to see who was giving them a shoutout.
Saint Louis, seeded fifth in the Midwest Region, worked five extra minutes Thursday night to avoid joining fellow No. 5’s Cincinnati and Oklahoma in falling to 12th seeds in the NCAA tournament. The Billikens advanced by wiping out a late double-digit deficit and beating North Carolina State 83-80 in overtime.
Shaking off a 23-foot miss at the second-half buzzer, Shabazz Napier scored nine of his 24 points in overtime to lead seventh-seeded UConn (27-8) to an 89-81 win over 10th-seeded Saint Joseph’s (24-10) in the second round of the NCAA tournament on Thursday night.
When it counted, Michigan exerted its will on an overmatched opponent. Glenn Robinson III scored 14 points, Jordan Morgan had 10 points and 10 rebounds, and the second-seeded Wolverines started their quest for a second straight trip to the Final Four by beating 15th-seeded Wofford 57-40 on Thursday night in the NCAA tournament.