After a good first day on Tuesday, marked in particular by the victory in the last moments of Pittsburgh against Mississippi State, the “First Four”, which designates the last four qualified, continued and concluded this night.
The most interesting of the two posters of the night was this ArizonaState – Nevada. Interesting, the match was indeed only on paper, since in fact, the confrontation very quickly turned into a “blowout”: 27 points difference at half-time, and a victory of 25 points in the end for these ruthless Sun Devils narrowly in attack (98-73), driven in particular by the pair of backs DJ Horne – Desmond Cambridge Jr. who combined 37 points at 12/20 on shots. Difficult to lose indeed when you turn collectively to 64% success on shots, including 52% behind the arc (11/21)!
Opposite, the Wolf Pack delivered a satisfying game on offense, with 48% shooting success and also an 11/21 from behind the arc, but were simply swallowed up by the attacking punching power of their opponents, who for to make matters worse also defended the lead by forcing 11 ball losses from Steve Alford’s men.
” It was a complete performance from us, the kind of performance we want to perform at this stage of the season. » logically appreciated Sun Devils coach Bobby Hurley. ” I feel our regular season schedule [en Pac-12] prepared us ideally for these cutting matches. It was a great performance, everyone contributed in attack. And our defense also allowed us to break away in the first half. »
Next up for Arizona State is a first round with a #11 seed in the West Region, against the #6 seeded TCU. A match that promises sparks, between two formations capable of catching fire on the offensive level…
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Note that the second game of the night also turned into a blowout: a 23-point victory (84-61) for Fairleigh Dickinson over Texas Southern. The Knights thus win a seeded #16, will now challenge the ogre Purdue, seeded #1 in the East region, in the first round.
