All-Access at the 1st/2nd rounds in San Diego: Arizona-TCU

The NCAA tournament is about basketball but also so much more: the fans, bands, cheerleaders, etc. The 1st/2nd rounds are taking place in 8 cities around the country and we could not be more excited to be there in person! HoopsHD is covering all of the angles and Jon Teitel concludes our coverage from San Diego with a recap of the Arizona-TCU 2nd round game last Sunday.

After I took a pregame photo with my Wildcat friend Mary and our beloved mascot Wilbur I jogged up to the top of the arena to have a quick visit with my Wildcat friend Dave, and then it was back downstairs and back to business.

The Horned Frogs got out to a quick 10-2 lead behind the FT shooting of SO PG Mike Miles Jr. and the 3-PT shooting of SR SF Chuck O’Bannon Jr.

The Wildcats got a much-needed breath of fresh air when Coach Tommy Lloyd subbed PG Kerr Kriisa into the game after he had missed the past 3 games with a sprained right ankle, causing the crowd to roar its approval.

Coach Lloyd implored the fans to keep getting louder, which they did, and instructed his team to get the ball to Christian Koloko, which they did to much success. He scored 14 PTS/6-6 FG in the 1st 9 minutes to help his team take an 18-7 lead.

TCU would not go away and almost took the lead late in the half. Arizona SO G/F Bennedict Mathurin made a corner 3 in the final 2 minutes that caused TCU coach Jamie Dixon to call a timeout to stop the bleeding.

Arizona was 27-1 this year when they have the lead at halftime so Coach Lloyd must have been encouraged to finish the 1st 20 minutes up 39-36.

TCU FR C Eddie Lampkin only scored 2 PTS in their win over Seton Hall on Friday but he plays with so much emotion that it was only a matter of time until he got back on track. He did exactly that on Sunday with 13 PTS/5-5 FG before limping to the bench early in the 2nd half with a right foot injury. He came back shortly thereafter and finished with career-highs of 20 PTS/14 REB but missed a ton of FTs (4-10).

Mathurin was a machine at the charity stripe with 9-10 FTs (after not attempting a single 1 vs. Wright State on Friday) and had a thunderous dunk over Lampkin to give his team a 54-52 lead and cause the fans in red and blue to scream at the top of their lungs. However, O’Bannon kept making threes and frees en route to a career-high 23 PTS. Arizona was 31-0 this year when leading with 5 minutes left, and Coach Lloyd called a timeout after a 7-0 run by the Horned Frogs to ensure that his team would still be up 67-65 as the clock struck 5 minutes to go, which they only maintained after Miles missed a layup at the 5:02 mark.

Miles came right back with a layup to finish a 10-0 run and retake the lead (68-67). The Wildcats were horrible from 3-PT range (5-27) but Mathurin made the biggest 1 of the night with 13 seconds left in regulation to tie it at 75-all. Miles lost the ball on a double-team, then Terry picked it up, drove to the hoop, and dunked it…right after the buzzer, so we are headed for overtime. Lampkin has not played more than 31 minutes in a game this year but would definitely break that record. Mathurin took over in overtime, tied a season-high with 30 PTS, and the Wildcats hung on to win it 85-80.

Coach Lloyd tried to console Lampkin because he was bawling his eyes out after the hard-fought loss:

The postgame celebration was fantastic, with Kriisa waving to the fans and Dalen Terry running around with a huge smile on his face.

In the postgame press conference I asked Mathurin about being undefeated this year when they have the lead with 5 minutes left. He said they came all the way from Tucson to San Diego for a reason: they came here to win. He knew that they had the fans cheering for them to win the game and they did it. I did not get a chance to ask Coach Lloyd any questions because they had a flight to catch.

The star of the show for the 2nd straight game was Koloko. He became the 2nd player in NCAA tourney history to ever have a game with 28 PTS/12 REB/92 FG% (the 1st: San Diego’s own Bill Walton in his famous 21-22 FG performance for UCLA over Memphis in the 1973 NCAA title game) and was simply unstoppable.

I even got to see Mathurin and Kriisa outside the arena before they hopped onto the team bus:

What a wonderful weekend in San Diego, hope you enjoyed it as much as I loved the beach.

I somehow made it to 27 basketball games in a 16-day stretch and have the security bands on my backpack to prove it: enjoy the Madness!