No team in the NCAA tournament was more devastated by upperclassmen’s exits than last year’s tournament runner-up.
And no team has recovered more valiantly than Arizona. The No. 3-seeded Wildcats disposed of No. 11 seed Wyoming 68-60 in Saturday’s second round of the West Regional in front of a hostile crowd of 15,867 at the Pit, which at times sounded like Wyoming’s home court with fans booing the Wildcats even before tipoff.
The Wildcats (24-9) silenced the crowd. Luke Walton hit two jumpers in the clutch to give Arizona a seven-point cushion that it would ride to victory.
“My shot was feeling kind of good, and both times I kind of got into the lane and they were playing for the pass,” said Walton, who finished with a game-high 21 points and nine rebounds. “I just hit them both.”
“He was just shooting over me and there was nothing I could do to stop it,” Wyoming forward Marcus Bailey said.
Wyoming (22-9) could not duplicate the clutch play the Cowboys used to topple No. 6 seed Gonzaga. Forwards Josh Davis and Bailey each scored 17 points for the Cowboys.
With the victory the Wildcats advance to the Sweet Sixteen for the seventh time in the last 12 seasons, where they will face the winner of Sunday’s Oklahoma-Xavier game.
The Wildcats, who only returned one starter from last season’s squad that lost to Duke in the final, appear to be peaking at the right time.
First, Arizona won the Pac-10 championship last week. Saturday, the Wildcats recorded their season-high sixth straight victory.
Point guard Jason Gardner, a junior who flirted with the NBA draft last summer before returning to school, finished the game with 14 points, eight assists and five rebounds.
The emergence of five true freshmen–particularly center Channing Fyre, who scored 18 points, grabbed 11 rebounds and blocked five shots–has kept the Wildcats on the prowl for the school’s second national title.
“It feels real good to be a team that was supposed to be going to the NIT, and here we are going to the Sweet Sixteen,” Gardner said. “There’s no better feeling than that.”
