Tigers

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (AP) &mdash; Creighton coach Greg McDermott understood what his team needed to do if it wanted to make school history.
Ryan Kalkbrenner, the Big East&rsquo;s two-time defensive player of the year, had to use his 7-foot-1 frame to overwhelm Princeton&rsquo;s defense. And 3-point specialist Baylor Scheierman needed to show what he could do defensively. Together, they teamed up to end Princeton&rsquo;s March Madness run.
Kalkbrenner scored 22 points, Scheierman had 21 and sixth-seeded Creighton marched on with an 86-75 victory over the 15th-seeded Tigers on Friday night that sent the Bluejays to their first Elite Eight since being part of an eight-team NCAA Tournament in 1941.
&ldquo;It&rsquo;s been amazing, it&rsquo;s been a dream come true. This is why I came to Creighton in the first place, to make a run with this group of guys,&rdquo; Scheierman said after making five 3-pointers and harassing Princeton&rsquo;s perimeter players. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s just been an incredible experience. I&rsquo;m looking forward to continuing that on Sunday.&rdquo;
Next up for Creighton is No. 5 seed San Diego State in the South Region final, with each team seeking its first Final Four. The surprising matchup could be entertaining because of the teams&rsquo; contrasting styles.
For Creighton to advance, Friday&rsquo;s big stars may need to duplicate their performances against the rugged Aztecs, particularly Kalkbrenner, who was 9 of 12 shooting despite a brief first-half benching because McDermott thought his big man&rsquo;s attitude needed work.
&ldquo;He just basically told me, get that frustrated look off my face and play with a little joy and have fun,&rdquo; Kalkbrenner said. &ldquo;I fixed it after that.&rdquo;
Soon after, the Bluejays (24-12) were celebrating.
The Tigers (23-9) were led by Ryan Langborg with 26 points and Ivy League player of the year Tosan Evbuomwan with 24 points, six rebounds and nine assists.
Princeton shook up brackets everywhere by beating No. 2 seed Arizona in the first round, then blew out seventh-seeded Missouri last weekend in Sacramento, California, to make its first Sweet 16 since 1967.
Princeton was seeking become the first Ivy League champ to make the Elite Eight since Penn&rsquo;s Final Four run in 1979, the first Tigers squad to reach the Final Four since Bill Bradley led them there in 1965, and the second straight No. 15 seed to play in a regional final. Saint Peter&rsquo;s last year became the first 15 seed to achieve that feat.
The Tigers came up short.
&ldquo;We had seen great size and length against Arizona, but we hadn&rsquo;t seen Kalkbrenner&rsquo;s agility and the speed, the way they were getting him the ball in different positions,&rdquo; coach Mitch Henderson said. &ldquo;I thought he was the key. They just got easy, easy baskets when they needed them.&rdquo;
Princeton&rsquo;s offense bore no resemblance to the back-cutting, deliberate style that defined the late Pete Carril&rsquo;s coaching tenure. Instead, the Tigers went toe to toe against fast-paced Creighton until stalling out at the start of the second half.
Creighton used a 9-2 run to take 56-45 lead, a four-minute stretch during which Henderson called two timeouts and Evbuomwan drew his third foul.
Nothing could stop the Bluejays, though. When Princeton cut the deficit to 61-52, Creighton answered with seven more points and the Tigers couldn&rsquo;t get closer than seven points again.
Now, after beating North Carolina State and third-seeded Baylor in Denver last weekend, drawing confidence from not needing oxygen masks like their opponents, Creighton has a chance at a program-changing victory.
&ldquo;At the end of the day, there&rsquo;s just eight teams left, and to be one of those eight teams is just crazy,&rdquo; Kalkbrenner said. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s what you work for all year. It&rsquo;s what you work for since you get here on campus in the summer, and this is all the hard work paying off now.&rdquo;
BIG PICTURE
Princeton: The Tigers didn&rsquo;t make it to Houston but they were among the many lower-seeded standouts during this delightfully unpredictable tournament.
Creighton: The Bluejays&rsquo; quick-hitting offense remains their signature. But over McDermott&rsquo;s 13 seasons, they&rsquo;ve developed a stronger interior presence &mdash; and a defense that makes opponents uncomfortable.
CASHING IN
The tourney run could prove advantageous to Evbuomwan&rsquo;s bank account.
&ldquo;There&rsquo;s been some stuff,&rdquo; he said when asked if he&rsquo;d been approached with any NIL deals this month. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a fun part of the game now.&rdquo;

The 86-75 victory sent the Bluejays to their first Elite Eight since being part of an eight-team NCAA Tournament in 1941.

Creighton ends Princeton’s March Madness run with 86-75 win

Princeton forward Tosan Evbuomwan spent his first three college seasons enduring one disappointment after another.
Reaching the NCAA Tournament and advancing to the Sweet 16 made it all worthwhile.
After the 2020 Ivy League Tournament was canceled, after the entire 2020-21 season was canceled, after losing by two points in the conference&rsquo;s 2022 tourney title game and after watching three friends transfer just to keep playing in 2022-23, this resilient 6-foot-8 Brit has taken the Tigers on their deepest NCAA Tournament run since 1967 and has emerged as survivor of one of college basketball&rsquo;s strangest journeys.
&ldquo;I think it did start with that COVID year,&rdquo; Evbuomwan said. &rdquo;There was a togetherness with that group. One of my favorite things about that time was the Zooms with one another, the Face Times, just talking about what we wanted the next season. We wanted a championship.&rdquo;
Now,&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/march-madness-princeton-3e7e64d87d64a24587f258af065e7ce0" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the Ivy League tourney champions are the talk of the nation</a>&nbsp;and an illustration of the impact two pivotal COVID years have had on the college basketball world.
Nobody outside the Princeton locker room expected this run &mdash; especially when three of last year&rsquo;s top five scorers left to take advantage of the NCAA&rsquo;s extra season. League rules allowed them only to use that season at a non-conference school.
But these Tigers pride themselves on perseverance. So instead of allowing the obstacles to derail their dreams or steal their spirit, they dug in, stuck around, forged a bond and finished the job.
&ldquo;We missed out on a whole year. That hurt, watching essentially every other team in the country play,&rdquo; Princeton guard Matt Allocco said. &ldquo;But I think it actually helped us in the long run. We were able to get together in the spring and practice, be with each other, build those relationships. It ended up being a great experience.&rdquo;
Not everyone remembers the COVID years fondly.
San Diego State and Dayton saw their 2020 title hopes dashed by the NCAA&rsquo;s announcement. Michigan State coach Tom Izzo thought he had a Final Four team, too.
Northern Kentucky coach Darrin Horn&rsquo;s long-awaited return to March Madness was extended by three more years, prompting him to acknowledge two weeks ago that winning the 2020 Horizon League crown almost seemed like it never happened.
There&rsquo;s no way to replace what was lost &mdash;&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/ncaa-march-madness-san-diego-state-charleston-orlando-0d6d6cd47a1ff1baa3bfb448286b0ff6" target="_blank" rel="noopener">even for this year&rsquo;s 16 regional semifinalists</a>.
Just ask San Diego State coach Brian Dutcher, whose team faces top-seeded Alabama on Friday in the Louisville Regional. The Aztecs were supposed to be a top-two seed three years ago.
&ldquo;As I said all those years ago, as good as Malachi Flynn and KJ Feagin and Yanni Wetzell were, they never played in the NCAA Tournament one time in their careers. That&rsquo;s unbelievable,&rdquo; Dutcher said. &ldquo;Sometimes we take for granted just going and losing in the first round. Just to have a chance to play would have meant the world to those guys so I feel bad for that, that they never got a taste of March Madness.&rdquo;
Meanwhile, at Creighton, it was a different scenario.
In 2021, the tourney provided the Bluejays with a bittersweet memory: Celebrating their first Sweet 16 appearance since 1974 inside the lonely Indianapolis &ldquo;bubble.&rdquo;
So when&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/march-madness-creighton-nembhard-d5b5da14046dffc8c7fb28e2f8b2da13" target="_blank" rel="noopener">sixth-seeded Creighton knocked off third-seeded Baylor 85-76 last weekend</a>&nbsp;to return to the Sweet 16, something suddenly felt far more satisfying about Friday&rsquo;s matchup against 15th-seeded Princeton in Louisville.
&ldquo;We had a lot of fans there to celebrate at the end of the game with us (in Denver) and then you go back to the hotel with family and friends and have a chance to celebrate rather than go back to your room and eat another piece of rubber chicken out of a Styrofoam box, which is what we did in Indianapolis,&rdquo; Creighton coach Greg McDermott said. &ldquo;To get to the Sweet 16 is a difficult thing to do, it was just a little more fun to celebrate that particular night.&rdquo;
What about 2021 national champion Baylor? Of course, the Bears had no complaints.
Kansas State coach Jerome Tang was an assistant on that title team and has used the lessons from that run as the model for his third-seeded Wildcats, who take on Izzo&rsquo;s seventh-seeded Spartans on Thursday at Madison Square Garden.
<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/march-madness-transfer-portal-0b9862a4e4e4b6da08ce56b3eb2c443a" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Tang believes the similarities in roster composition</a>&nbsp;will help Kansas State this weekend.
&ldquo;We spent 30 days in the &lsquo;bubble,&rsquo; right? And if you don&rsquo;t like each other, nobody wants to spend that amount of time together,&rdquo; Tang said. &ldquo;That team, we really liked each other. We loved being together. I mean, it was fun to be around them. I feel the same way around these guys. We could be in a bubble for 30 days and we&rsquo;ll be just fine. We&rsquo;re going to have a great time.&rdquo;
But nobody will have more fun than Princeton.
Just two years after watching everyone else&rsquo;s games, the Tigers need two wins to end a 48-year Final Four drought, two wins to become the first Ivy League team in the national semifinals since Penn in 1979 and two wins to cement their status as one of the greatest and most compelling advance-and-survive stories in tourney history.
And it might not have happened without Princeton&rsquo;s COVID experience.
&ldquo;Having to watch those games on TV, the tournament, hurt. I think looking back on it, it fueled us for the next year,&rdquo; Princeton guard Ryan Langborg said. &ldquo;I think this year, this Sweet 16 run so far, it&rsquo;s more than making up for it.&rdquo;

Princeton is on its deepest NCAA Tournament run since 1967 after surviving one of college basketball’s strangest journeys.

Princeton’s journey becomes face of March Madness’ COVID era

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) &mdash; As the final minute ticked off the clock, the Princeton fans started chanting &ldquo;Sweet 16! Sweet 16!&rdquo; and coach Mitch Henderson cleared the bench with the victory easily in hand.
This upset was no small-school fluke against a more heralded team. It was a thoroughly dominating performance that sent Princeton to a place it hadn&rsquo;t been in more than a half-century.
Blake Peters made five 3-pointers in the second half and&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://twitter.com/MarchMadnessMBB/status/1637239957298483200?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Princeton shocked another power conference team</a>&nbsp;to reach the NCAA Tournament regional semifinals for the first time in 56 years by beating Missouri 78-63 on Saturday.
&ldquo;The world looks at us as two upsets,&rdquo; forward Tosan Evbuomwan said. &ldquo;But I feel like we&rsquo;re supposed to be here. We have a lot of confidence in one another, what we&rsquo;re doing. There&rsquo;s definitely no letup with this group.&rdquo;
The No. 15 seeded Princeton (23-8) followed up&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/march-madness-ncaa-arizona-princeton-4b28e0acabe2b75ccdbac81d40a6fd66" target="_blank" rel="noopener">a first-round win</a>&nbsp;over Pac-12 tournament champion Arizona by overwhelming seventh-seeded Missouri (25-10) of the Southeastern Conference from the start.
The Ivy League school known for&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/article/march-madness-princeton-3e7e64d87d64a24587f258af065e7ce0" target="_blank" rel="noopener">giving powerhouses scares and occasionally pulling off upsets</a>&nbsp;a generation ago has reached the&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://apnews.com/hub/march-madness" target="_blank" rel="noopener">round of 16</a> for the first time since 1967 when only 23 teams even made the tournament.
&ldquo;I have no words for you,&rdquo; Peters said. &ldquo;We have such an unbelievable section (of fans) here. I have the best teammates in the world. I love each and every one of them. when we go out and believe in each other, anything is possible. I know it&rsquo;s cliche, but anything is possible.&rdquo;
Princeton will play the winner of Sunday&rsquo;s game between Baylor and Creighton in the Sweet 16 in Louisville, Kentucky, on Friday night.
The Tigers will be the second Ivy League school to make the Sweet 16 in the past 43 tournaments, joining Cornell in 2010. No team from the academically prestigious league that doesn&rsquo;t give athletic scholarships has gone further since Penn made the Final Four in 1979.
&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always dreamed of playing deep into the tournament,&rdquo; said Henderson, a player on Princeton&rsquo;s teams in 1996 and &rsquo;98 that won first-round games. &ldquo;As a player, got to the second round a couple times. Never got beyond it.&rdquo;
This marks the third straight year a team seeded 15th made it to the Sweet 16, following Oral Roberts in 2021 and fellow New Jersey school Saint Peter&rsquo;s last year. The only other time a 15 seed made it this far came in 2013 when Florida Gulf Coast did it.
Ryan Langborg led Princeton with 22 points and Peters added 17.
DeAndre Gholston scored 19 points and Noah Carter added 14 for Missouri, which was seeking its first berth in the Sweet 16 since 2009.
&ldquo;We were able to get the lead one time,&rdquo; coach Dennis Gates said. &ldquo;We held the lead for 30 seconds in the entire game. Every time we got the lead or when they had the lead, we cut it to six, they came back down and did what a good team would do: Make a shot or make a play.&rdquo;
Princeton showed no signs of being outclassed against another power conference team, controlling the play from the start. Keeshawn Kellman had two dunks and a blocked shot in a span of 16 seconds midway through the half.
Princeton built the lead to 10 points on a corner 3 by Zach Martini and went up 33-19 on a drive by Evbuomwan.
Missouri responded by scoring the final seven points of the half to go into the break down seven.
Every time Missouri threatened early in the second half, Princeton had an answer with&nbsp;<a class="paragraph-link" href="https://twitter.com/MarchMadnessMBB/status/1637241107519254528?s=20" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Peters hitting five 3-pointers</a>. The fourth gave Princeton a 62-43 lead and Missouri never threatened after that.
&ldquo;Blake Peters has been making shots coming off the bench for us for weeks,&rdquo; Henderson said. &ldquo;This is a very, very confident group. We are so thrilled to be going to the Sweet 16. It is an absolute pleasure being around these guys. They just grit their teeth and they do it.&rdquo;
BIG PICTURE
Princeton: Princeton was more than a match physically with Missouri with a 44-30 rebounding edge and 16 offensive rebounds that led to 19 second-chance points. Caden Pierce led the way with 16 rebounds.
&ldquo;They&rsquo;re playing absolutely fearless,&rdquo; Henderson said. &ldquo;They&rsquo;re unafraid of anyone.&rdquo;
Missouri: Coach Dennis Gates&rsquo; first season at Missouri was a successful one with 25 wins but still had a disappointing finish.
UP NEXT
Princeton will look for its first Elite Eight appearance since 1965 when Bill Bradley was the star.

Princeton shocked another power conference team to reach the Sweet 16, beating Missouri 78-63 on Saturday.

15th-seeded Princeton beats Missouri 78-63 to reach Sweet 16

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) &mdash;&nbsp;Mitch Henderson&rsquo;s victory leap&nbsp;that punctuated Princeton&rsquo;s famed upset over UCLA in 1996 has become an iconic moment. There is a picture of the joyous jump at the school&rsquo;s practice facility that serves as a constant reminder of what&rsquo;s possible.
Now Henderson&rsquo;s current players have authored one of their own.
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-theme="dark">
History repeats itself. Pete Carril is smiling upstairs - Congrats <a href="https://twitter.com/M_Henderson98?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@M_Henderson98</a> <a href="https://t.co/V2cbrCVz6I">pic.twitter.com/V2cbrCVz6I</a>
&mdash; Doug Gottlieb (@GottliebShow) <a href="https://twitter.com/GottliebShow/status/1636493636153262081?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 16, 2023</a></blockquote>

<script src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>

Ryan Langborg lifted Princeton&nbsp;to its first lead with 2:03 to play and the Tigers used a late-game run to earn their first NCAA Tournament win in 25 years, topping No. 2 seed Arizona 59-55 on Thursday.
&ldquo;Pretty surreal feeling,&rdquo; guard Matt Allocco said. &ldquo;To beat a great team like that on this stage is a pretty special feeling. But also I can&rsquo;t say I&rsquo;m surprised. This team has been so good all year, so gritty. On paper, it&rsquo;s going to look like a big upset. But we believe in each other and we think we&rsquo;re a really good team. When we&rsquo;re at our best, then I think we can beat anybody in the country.&rdquo;
The 15th-seeded Tigers (22-9) scored the final nine points, holding the Pac-12 Tournament champion scoreless over the final 4:43.
Tosan Evbuomwan scored 15 points in Princeton&rsquo;s first tournament victory since beating UNLV in 1998 when Henderson was a player for the Tigers.
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Henderson also played on the 1996 team that beat defending champion UCLA in the school&rsquo;s final tournament under coach Pete Carril, who died in August. This victory fittingly came in Sacramento, where Carril spent time as an NBA assistant after retiring as Tigers coach.
&ldquo;He would be very proud of the group,&rdquo; Henderson said. &ldquo;He wouldn&rsquo;t want any attention to be brought other than what these guys did. They played to win. We knew we had to keep the game low possessions.&rdquo;
Princeton advanced to play seventh-seeded Missouri in the second round of the South Region. The Tigers beat Utah State 76-65.
Azuolas Tubelis scored 22 points for the Wildcats (28-7), who haven&rsquo;t won a tournament game in consecutive years since 2014-15.
It marked the third straight year and 11th time overall that a No. 15 seed won a first-round game. Arizona is the only school to be on the wrong end of one of those upsets twice, also losing to Steve Nash and Santa Clara in 1993.
&ldquo;If you want to be a great player, you want to be a great coach, we all got to learn from this,&rsquo;&rdquo; coach Tommy Lloyd said. &ldquo;We got to go back and figure out what happened and understand the value of being up 10 to 12 points with 10 minutes to go, putting the hammer on people, not letting people get back in the game.&rdquo;
The Wildcats seemed in control of this one when Oumar Ballo&rsquo;s basket put them up 10 with eight minutes left.
But the Tigers responded with seven straight points, capped by&nbsp;a second-chance 3-pointer&nbsp;from Blake Peters that made it 51-48 with about six minutes left.
They closed the game with a 9-0 run &mdash; just like they did in their most memorable tournament win against UCLA in 1996.
Keeshawn Kellman started the spurt with a putback dunk before Langborg hit a jumper and then a layup to give the Tigers the lead.
The Wildcats then missed all five shots down the stretch and Princeton put it away at the foul line. Langborg also blocked Courtney Ramey&rsquo;s shot with 50 seconds left and the Tigers protecting a one-point lead.
&ldquo;When I blocked it I saw the whole crowd erupt,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;My teammates were all locked in with each other and it was kind of that moment where you know, like, &lsquo;Wow we can really do this. We&rsquo;re going to do this and nothing&rsquo;s going to stop us.&rsquo;&rdquo;
Ramey, who hit a game-winning shot in the Pac-12 Tournament, missed a contested 3-pointer with 14 seconds left that could have tied the game. Kerr Kriisa also missed from long range after an offensive rebound,&nbsp;sending Princeton into an early celebration.
LET THEM PLAY
The game featured just 12 free throws, with four coming after intentional fouls by Arizona late in the game. The Wildcats went to the line seven times despite a big size advantage with Tubelis and Bello.
&ldquo;You go inside over and over and over again, and you shoot seven free throws. I mean, I don&rsquo;t know if they&rsquo;re fouls or not. They must not have been because obviously they didn&rsquo;t get called,&rdquo; Lloyd said. &ldquo;When the game is reffed like that, it makes it tough.&rdquo;
BIG PICTURE
Princeton: The Tigers gave the Ivy League its first tournament win since 2016 when Yale beat Baylor. The conference had been one-and-done the last four trips, having missed the 2021 edition because of COVID-19.
Arizona: The Wildcats got little help offensively outside of Tubelis and Ballo, who combined for 35 points. The rest of the team shot 9 for 27.
UP NEXT
Princeton will look to win two games in the tournament for the first time since 1983.

The 15th-seeded Tigers (22-9) scored the final nine points to finish the upset, holding the Wildcats scoreless over the final 4:21.