SAN ANTONIO — The last time Houston made consecutive trips to the round of 8 in the N.C.A.A. tournament was in a vastly different era of college basketball — when the program dominated in the early 1980s with its high-flying pace with Hakeem Olajuwon and Clyde Drexler, two Naismith Hall of Famers, and was famously given the name Phi Slama Jama.
Houston, a No. 5 seed in this year’s tournament, easily dispatched its first two opponents, No. 12-seeded University of Alabama at Birmingham and No. 4-seeded Illinois, and the Cougars seemed to handle Arizona, the South Region’s top seed, almost just as easily on Thursday night, beating the Wildcats 72-60 in the round of 16.
Arizona became the third No. 1 seed to fall this tournament, after Gonzaga lost earlier Thursday night and Baylor was knocked out in the round of 32. The only remaining No. 1 is Kansas, which plays its round of 16 game against Providence on Friday.
Houston players slipped by Arizona defenders for easy layups. They crashed the offensive glass to create more possessions. Their athletic blocks fired up their fans, who took up a sizable portion of the seats inside the AT&T Center in San Antonio, about a three-hour drive from the university’s campus.
They turned great defense into effortless offense.
In the first half, Houston guard Jamal Shead intercepted Arizona center Christian Koloko’s cross-court pass and scored a fast-break layup. On Arizona’s next offensive possession, forward Fabian White Jr. blocked Azuolas Tubelis’s driving layup attempt and corralled the rebound to set up another layup at the other basket. Those were indicators of why Houston entered the tournament with one of the top-ranked defenses in Division I.
By the end of the first half, the Cougars, winners of the American Athletic Conference tournament, had outscored Arizona in the paint 18 to 4, and held Arizona to 1 of 6 on layups.
Arizona’s ability to get to the free-throw line and force Houston players into foul trouble was a big reason the Wildcats’ halftime deficit was only 6 points.
Taze Moore, one of Houston’s starting guards who averages about 30 minutes per game, spent much of the first half on the bench with three fouls and picked up a fourth less than 10 minutes into the second half. He finished with just 3 points.
Turnovers and allowing second-chance points hurt Arizona in the first two rounds against Wright State and Texas Christian. Untimely turnovers kept the Wildcats from cutting too far into Houston’s lead, even when they went on runs to cut it to 4 or 3 points. Houston scored 24 points off turnovers compared with Arizona’s 6.
The Cougars have never won an N.C.A.A. men’s basketball championship, not in six trips to the Final Four, not even with some of the most lauded players in basketball history. Athleticism and grit have carried this Cougars team this far, and on Thursday the Cougars seemed determined to make sure that drought didn’t continue for another season.
Dive Deeper Into the N.C.A.A. Tournaments
As the final seconds ticked off the clock, they had already started celebrating, as Arizona players crouched to the court with tears in their eyes — not the first No. 1 seed to suffer an early exit in an N.C.A.A. tournament, and surely not the last.
— Alanis Thames
Duke has the Final Four in its sights.
SAN FRANCISCO — For much of the night, Mike Krzyzewski took his usual spot on the Duke bench — the third seat from the scorer’s table — and stayed there. His hands fidgeted, sometimes resting on his chin, other times gesturing down the bench or pointing to a spot on the court where he wanted a player to station himself.
But as the clock ticked down — and the tension ratcheted up — Krzyzewski was on his feet. If this was it, the final game of his storied career, he was at least going down standing, calling out plays, orchestrating the offense and exhorting the defense.
And so it was as Duke extended Krzyzewski’s career another night, holding off Texas Tech for a 78-73 victory to advance to the brink of the Final Four. Earlier, the path had been cleared of Gonzaga, the No. 1 overall seed in the bracket, which lost to Arkansas, though the Blue Devils had already beaten the Zags earlier this season.
Adonis Arms hit a 3-pointer that put Texas Tech within 75-73 with 13.1 seconds left. After Texas Tech called a timeout, the Red Raiders fouled A.J. Griffin, who made both free throws with 12.9 seconds left. Duke then intentionally fouled to drain time from the clock, and when Arms missed another 3-pointer and Paulo Banchero grabbed the rebound, Krzyzewski threw his arms in the air.
When the buzzer sounded, he slapped his hands together and began to walk toward the Texas Tech bench, thrilled to coach one more day.
It was a balanced effort that bought the Blue Devils another day with Banchero scoring 22 points, Jeremy Roach breaking down the Texas Tech defense to add 15 points and 5 assists, and center Mark Williams adding 16 points, 8 rebounds and 3 blocks.
But it was at the defensive end where Duke found some much-needed resolve, including resurrecting their floor slap with a minute left to play, which riled the crowd.
Duke arrived here with wins over Cal State Fullerton and Michigan State, the later one a severe test, having to rally late without Griffin, who had injured his ankle. Krzyzewski afterward appeared as drained as his players — and just as buoyed to be moving on.
Krzyzewski, 75, took the rare step last June of announcing his retirement effective at the end of this season. It will continue for at least one more game, Saturday against Arkansas.
Texas Tech did not make it easy, though. The Red Raiders have the most efficient defense in the country, according to Ken Pomeroy’s statistical analysis, forcing the ball to one side of the lane, then overloading their defense in that direction. Mark Adams, the architect of the defense, was an assistant in 2019 when the Red Raiders came within a last-second shot of winning the national title.
Adams, 65, who has spent his career beating the bushes of junior college and small college basketball, had to rebuild the roster. Among those who arrived was Kevin Obanor, who helped lead Oral Roberts on a stunning run to the round of 16 last year.
Obanor was very much at home on this stage on Thursday night, notching a double-double with 10 points and 10 rebounds. But it wasn’t enough to advance.
— Billy Witz
Villanova tops Michigan, despite poor shooting.
SAN ANTONIO — Villanova, leading by 6 points in a game that felt closer with eight minutes remaining, was patient and precise. Players zipped the ball around and across Michigan defenders, waiting for the ideal scoring opportunity. Finally, Caleb Daniels, Villanova’s redshirt senior guard, grabbed the ball in the paint and drove forward, his body running into the 6-foot-11 Wolverines forward Moussa Diabate as the ball went through the hoop. The sound of an official’s whistle followed, setting up a 3-point play.
The Wildcats didn’t join their fans in celebrating, though. They got back on defense. The No. 11-seeded Wolverines, like they had all evening, were sure to respond. And with a pair of jump shots and some free throws, Villanova’s lead, once 9 in the half, was 4.
But No. 2-seeded Villanova, after playing far from its best game, got a driving layup by Jermaine Samuels and a 3-pointer on its next possession, establishing enough of a cushion to get past the Wolverines, 63-55, on Thursday in the round of 16 in San Antonio.
Coach Jay Wright’s Wildcats, one of two Big East teams left in the N.C.A.A. tournament along with Providence, have shown that the conference is all but theirs until another program pries it out of their 3-point-shooting hands. But any team that was ranked as high as No. 4 in the regular season would be looking for more than a conference championship, which the Wildcats won in Madison Square Garden this month for the fourth time since 2017.
“We’re beat up. We’ve got to rest up,” Wright said. “We can learn a little bit watching film. It’s about surviving now.”
Villanova took down Michigan in the national title game in 2018, but has had worse luck in the tournament since: In 2019, the Wildcats were defeated by Purdue in the second round, and last year they were knocked out in the round of 16 by Baylor, the eventual champion.
But now, the Wildcats are one win away from their seventh Final Four appearance in program history during a run in which they have won two national championships since 2016 and produced formidable N.B.A. talent.
Donte DiVincenzo of the Sacramento Kings, Mikal Bridges of the Phoenix Suns, Jalen Brunson of the Dallas Mavericks and more have come through the program in recent years.
Collin Gillespie, Villanova’s sharpshooting graduate student guard, will enter the upcoming draft after leading the Wildcats with nearly 16 points per game this season and stationing himself as one of the best 3-point shooters in men’s college basketball. Gillespie hit four of 10 3-point attempts against Michigan, playing all but one minute and finishing with 12 points.
Villanova, as a team, didn’t shoot the ball well from beyond the arc. Of 30 3-point attempts, Villanova made nine, while the Wolverines were 6 of 18 from deep.
Michigan surprised many by reaching this round of the tournament, given the Wolverines’ up-and-down season, which included Coach Juwan Howard’s five-game suspension after a postgame skirmish with a Wisconsin coach. But the Wolverines had the size advantage they needed to be successful against the smaller Wildcats. Michigan went down low to its leading scorer and big man, Hunter Dickinson, early, and he found success there, finishing with 15 points and 15 rebounds despite being in foul trouble. Villanova inserted a smaller lineup and drew two quick fouls on Dickinson in the first half, and he finished with four fouls.
“We didn’t run into anybody anywhere like Hunter Dickinson,” Wright said after the game. “Man, this dude is a handful. He’s got size, girth, strength, skill, intelligence, competitiveness. We run into some good ones in the middle, but I think he’s the best we’ve run into this year.”
But on a mediocre shooting night for both teams, Michigan missed too many of the shots that mattered, including, uncharacteristically, the ones around the rim and half of its free throws.
“We got good looks,” said Eli Brooks, Michigan’s graduate student guard. “We just didn’t capitalize. I think we got the looks that we wanted. We just didn’t make the shots.”
— Alanis Thames
