Villanova’s Ryan Arcidiacono responds to questions as teammate Daniel Ochefu listens during a news conference before a second-round men’s college basketball game against Iowa in the NCAA Tournament, Saturday, March 19, 201…
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Stephen F. Austin’s second-round NCAA Tournament game is being played very differently from the first. “We’re all extremely glad to get that monkey off of our back”.
The Wildcats (30-5), the No. 2 seed in the South Region, will try to advance to the Sweet 16 for the third time in the past six years when they face No. 7-seed Iowa (22-10) at Barclays Center. You’re going to have to deal with it. It’s like the Buffalo Bills…. Moreover, Villanova wasn’t as reliant on the 3-point shot on Sunday as it had been the past two seasons in the NCAA tournament – but the Wildcats were knocking them down consistently.
“It means a lot for us and just for this program”, he said. We haven’t come through in the second round of the tournament.
After nearly every reporter had cleared out of Iowa’s locker room following the game, Gesell and Uthoff planted folding chairs near Woodbury’s cubicle, forming a triangle of dejection. Let’s just do what we do. “I can’t really tell people how they should look at our senior class or myself in particular”. “We came in humbled and we came in hungry”.
“We were able to be loose with each other”, Hart said. “But we definitely can go all the way as long as we stick to what we do”. After all, the team hasn’t advanced to the Sweet 16 since 2009.
Villanova, now 31-5, is making its 17th trip in school history to the Sweet 16 and fifth under Jay Wright.
“It was definitely a big time sigh of relief”, Arcidiacono said afterward.
“I’m honestly just done answering the questions about getting to the second weekend”, Arcidiacono said afterward. “I know it was always in the back of our seniors’ minds and our team”. Villanova outscored Iowa in the paint (36-26), on the break (18-0) and in points off turnovers (14-8).
The Hawkeyes watched another season come to an upsetting end Sunday, getting blown out of the Big Dance as Villanova ran away with a 87-68 win in Brooklyn. All in all, from that 28-21 score, the Wildcats outscored the Hawkeyes, 26-8, the remainder of the half, Iowa scoring just eight points over the final eight and a half minutes before halftime.
Villanova finished shooting 59.3 percent from the field, a staggering number, especially when compared to Iowa’s 45-percent mark.
With 13:37 remaining in the first half, the game was tied at 13 after Iowa’s Dom Uhl sank a long-range basket. Sunday was not going to be like losing to CT in Buffalo, New York, two years ago, nor was it going to be like losing to North Carolina State in a virtual home game in Pittsburgh last March. “You don’t get as much of a following”, said Fionn Buttner of Dublin, Ireland.
How did they keep their composure?
The University of Miami was founded in 1926, but its beginnings were, shall we say, inauspicious.
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Iowa (7) began their NCAA Tournament play against a tough tenth-seeded Temple team that pushed them to the limit. I’m not sure how they got a draw to be a seven seed. “We lost the game'”. Here’s everything you need to know about the Hawkeyes. “Fortunately, it was good enough for them”. “If we could have made a few, maybe it would have been a little bit different”. “When I shook hands with Fran (McCaffrey), I just said, ‘Hey, I’m sorry.’ We haven’t played a first half like that in a long time”.
