This year’s NCAA Tournament has had a lot of chalk. That actually continued for most of Friday night, but there was one very notable interruption: the first top seed to go down. It happened as one team continued to be on a late season roll.
As the chalk continued on Friday night, Auburn remained hot and knocked off North Carolina 97-80 to be the lowest seed in the Elite Eight. The Tigers shot 54.5 percent from the field, including a sterling 17-37 from long range, to knock off a Tar Heel team that had been under the radar for so much of the season. It marks the first time in 33 years Auburn will be in the Elite Eight.
Auburn didn’t take the lead or take over the game right away. North Carolina had a 39-35 lead late in the first half, but the Tigers scored the last six points of the first half and then the first eight of the second half to open up a double-digit lead. North Carolina would get within 60-54 with under 14 minutes left, but Auburn responded with the next 10 points as part of a 16-3 run to put some distance between them the rest of the way.
The win did not come easily in an emotional sense, though. Sophomore forward Chuma Okeke, who does a lot for this team, drove to the basket with about eight minutes left to play, and then his left knee buckled. Down he went, not looking good, and he needed a lot of help to get off the court. Okeke had 20 points and 11 rebounds in just 25 minutes before getting hurt, just one more big game the team’s leading rebounder and third-leading scorer had on the season, including 18 points and 13 rebounds in the SEC championship game.
At that point, the Tigers led 76-62. They would only pick it up from there, not missing a beat at a time when it would have been easy to lose focus with an important player going down like that.
It’s important to remember that as with Oregon, the only double-digit seed to reach the Sweet 16, Auburn was expected to get about this far, if not further. While the Tigers did watch leading scorer Mustapha Heron transfer, they brought back just about everyone of consequence from last season and were also set to gain Austin Wiley and Danjel Purifoy, talented players who sat out last season with eligibility concerns.
The Tigers largely coasted through non-conference play, losing to Duke in the Maui Invitational but otherwise taking care of business save for a 78-71 loss at NC State in which they turned the ball over 25 times. SEC play, though, was another matter, as they opened with a 15-point loss at Ole Miss and would soon lose three in a row to drop to 2-4 in the early going. Even as they regrouped, you felt like this team was rather unimpressive all along, and they were largely viewed as a bubble team until they finally put it together late in the season and the SEC Tournament to enter the NCAA Tournament with eight straight wins, two of them over Tennessee.
Now Auburn is off to the Elite Eight, where the rematch many expected between North Carolina and Kentucky will instead be a different one. The last time Auburn lost was when Kentucky handled them at Rupp Arena by a score of 80-53. It was also the Tigers’ last loss. Kentucky won both meetings between the two in the regular season, scoring a two-point win at Auburn to start the aforementioned three-game losing streak. But this looks more like the Auburn team most thought we would see before the season, and they already took care of some chalk on Friday night.
Side Dishes
As alluded to earlier, Kentucky got past Houston 62-58 on Friday night, though not without some drama. Kentucky blew a 13-point lead in the second half and needed a late three-pointer from Tyler Herro to go ahead and hang on late in the Midwest region. Kentucky held Houston below 40 percent from the field and had a 36-23 rebounding edge to overcome 14 turnovers.
In the East region, Michigan State had a little too much for LSU in their 80-63 win. Aaron Henry had the big game for the Spartans with 20 points, eight rebounds and six assists, the first player to put those numbers up in a regional semifinal since Duke’s Grant Hill – who, ironically, was part of the TV crew for this one – in 1994. The Spartans shot 47 percent from the field, including 13-32 from long range. In the nightcap, Virginia Tech gave Duke all they could handle before a case of deja vu sent Duke on to the Elite Eight with a 75-73 win. Down by two late, Virginia Tech had chances, but none dropped to either tie or win it, and the Blue Devils survived again despite being without Cam Reddish due to a bum knee.
Cal has hired former Nevada and Georgia head coach Mark Fox to run the program, succeeding Wyking Jones. Fox had a great run at Nevada before being snakebit at Georgia, so he’s had success out west in the past and from that standpoint is a sensible hire.
Early entrants to the NBA Draft continue to make the news, with a noteworthy one on Friday being Yale star Miye Oni. One of the Ivy League’s best players and a late bloomer, Oni told ESPN he is likely to stay in the draft but did the Undergraduate Advisory Request to preserve his eligibility.
Tonight’s Menu
We’ll know half of the Final Four when the night is done as two regional finals are on the slate.
- In Anaheim, the West regional final has No. 1 Gonzaga taking on No. 3 Texas Tech (6:09 p.m.)
- In Louisville, the South regional final has No. 1 Virginia taking on No. 3 Purdue (8:49 p.m.)
