Top storylines from the third day of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament

Michael Cohen

College football and college basketball author

An opening of two days, which largely formed upset for a weekend with high-ranking basketball in the NCAA tournament. On paper, the matchups in this year’s 32nd round were about as delicious as the fans could hope, and the first half of these thrillers delivered a handful of thrillers.

John Calipari was the best of Rick Pitino. There was an absolute shootout between Wisconsin and Byu. There was a comeback in the second half of Michigan, which kept this dream season under the head coach of the first year, Dusty May, alive for at least a few more days. And there is a good chance that the games will be even better on Sunday.

Here is an overview of the biggest storylines and moments from the third day of the NCAA tournament:

BYU holds Wisconsin and ends the perfect run from Big Ten

This is how the big ten looked into this year’s Big Dance: The second -Same state of Michigan, who won the title of the league, bounced off in the semi -finals of Wisconsin’s conference tournament. Maryland with the fourth seed, which was probably the second best team in the league in the regular season, was recorded by Michigan in the semi -finals of the conference tournament. Purdue with the fourth seed, which reached the national title game last year, had lost six of his previous nine games. Illinois, who fought against injury and illness problems for months, was beaten by the Terrapins in the Big Ten tournament. And Michigan had lost four of his last six games in the regular season with the fifth time that the conference tournament won.

In other words, dynamics were not exactly on the Big Ten side when his participants entered March Madness to pursue the first national title of the conference for 25 years.

All of this explains why the 10-0 record of the league to start the NCAA tournament has expanded so many eyes in the entire sport, especially since the SEC teams limp with almost as many losses as victories through the opening weekend. An event that many expected to be a crowning glory for the Sec that set up a NCAA record by sending 11 teams onto the field turned into the big invitation.

But all good things have to come to an end, even if Wisconsin star John Tohnje sets up a school record for points in a NCAA tournament game with 37. The Cougars, who occupy ninth place in the offensive efficiency, built an 11-point half-time in the lead by shooting 47.2% out of the ground and making all seven free throwing in the opening street. Despite a significant disadvantage against the Badgers, a plus-12 rebound edge achieved a 12-2 advantage in points of the second chance. They produced almost twice as many templates (11) as in the first 20 minutes by sales (six).

In the thinnest edges, this 11-point lead turned out to be a large scenery to ward off Wisconsin in the second half. The Badgers were unable to slow down the balanced offensive attack from BYU to the dwindling moments, and seven different cougars scored at least seven points, including four players in double numbers. The dynamic striker Richie Saunders performed with 25 points and seven rebounds at 9-of-16 shooting and spent the badger on all three levels: on the trail, on the free sausage line and beyond the arch. In the last five minutes, he scored six points to keep the victory and push BYU into the sweet 16 when Tonje despair shortly before the Summer went wrong.

This is the fifth time in Wisconsin’s last five NCAA tournament appearances that the Badgers have not reached the second weekend under head coach Greg Gard.

The former Buckeye Roddy Gayle Jr. plays the role of the hero for Michigan

For Roddy Gayle Jr., the negative discourse on his junior season on April 21, 2024 began, the day when he decided to switch to Michigan and play for the new head coach Dusty May. With Gayle’s decision there was nothing wrong with Michigan to be an athlete to be an athlete, and May had brought his old team Florida Atlantic to the last four-but every change in loyalty from Ohio to the Wolverines is asked with a question. And Gayle had spent the first two years of his career at the Buckeyes, whose fans were not enthusiastic about his new area scheme.

In the first few weeks of the season, Gayle quickly won over Michigan’s fan base with a number of impressive evaluation efforts. In his debut against Cleveland State, he scored 13 points and 11 points in his second game against Wake Forest. A few days later, mid-November, he achieved 10, 16 and 20 on successive excursions, while he proved to be a reliable perimeter shooter.

But worship began to fade from the last phases of the regular season, with Gayle gaining a hail of criticism from the fans when his rotary rehearsal sets immersed them and installed its sales. May even dropped him from the starting line -up in favor of Rubin Jones, another newcomer from North Texas. From January 27 to the end of the regular season, Gayle scored two goals twice within 12 games. His self -confidence seemed to be shot for outsiders.

For this reason, Michigans 91-79 victory against Texas A&M for the fourth seed for Gayle must have been so satisfactory, which entered a season height and team height of 26 points when he needed it most urgently. Gayle shot 7 out of 14 out of the field, including 4-on-6 from the 3-point range, and did all eight of his free throws in an undoubtedly the best performance since an outbreak of 32 points with the state of Ohio on December 30, 2023 in an overtime win against West Virginia. Gayle scored 21 of his points in the second half of the game on Saturday evening and helped Michigan to delete a 10-point deficit in the last 13 minutes.

The production of Gayle and Start Center Vlad Goldin, who brought 23 points and grabbed 12 rebounds, was enough for the Wolverines to overcome modest evaluation efforts by some of their other stars. Power Forward Danny Wolf and Point Guard Tre Donaldson only combined 22 points, but the latter converted a nice, falling layup in traffic: 59 remained that the game brought almost out of reach.

And now, after two years of senselessness under the former coach Juwan Howard, the Wolverines are bound to the Sweet 16 in the first May season.

St. John’s is freezing in the injury of the second round against Arkansas

Since the middle of the season, at this point, it became clear that St. Johns deserved the considerations among the best teams in the country, the analysts have wondered what would happen if the proverbial Achilles sales of the Red Storm really raised his ugly head. In other words, the group of head coach Rick Pitino-die could hold out in a game in a game of the 32nd round in a game in a game in a game in a game in a game when their statistically cool perimeter shooting became particularly icy? Could the red storm find a way to win?

What was nothing more than a thought experiment for most of the season was finally examined against Arkansas in Arkansas on Saturday afternoon, a trip to the Sweet 16 at stake. St. John’s, who broke out 3 points in the opening round for 14 years in a comprehensive 83-53 win against Omaha, began to miss suddenly. And Miss and Miss and Miss. Only one of the 13 attempts of the Red Storm from the 3-point area found the goal during a grid in the first half against the razor bakes, which were similarly inefficient even on the beet. The only player who had joined a 3 pointer for St. Johns was Reserve Guard Lefteris Liotopoulos underlined how bad the situation was. The starter Kadary Richmond, Aaron Scott and RJ Luis Jr. failed in all six shots.

The result was a three-point half-time lead for Arkansas, whose coach John Calipari put together a squad with enough length and sportiness in order to compensate for the advantages of St. Johns to neutralize or at least. The Calipari team approved the Red Sturm with 18 points in the color during the opening verse and almost corresponded to them on the glass (29-25 in favor of St. John’s). The basics had been laid for a potential disorder of the seismic size; After all, the Razorbacks almost completely missed the NCAA tournament after they had a regular season of 19: 12, in which they had lost more second games than they won.

And somehow the performance of St. John’s performance somehow worsened in the middle of some conflicts of unknown reasons from there only from there. The Red Storm missed 11 consecutive field goal attempts from 3:40 of the first half until 18:00 mark of the second. With 6:28, Richmond dried up in just 16 minutes, his last statistics with the same number of points (five) as fouls (five) in a shocking display. Luis, who was appointed Big East player of the year, spent the last 4:56 on the bench for reasons that were not immediately clear, even though he fell a terrible 3-against-17 shootout.

But it was not as if the red storm were without chances, especially in the last few minutes. When the players of Arkansas were under pressure, the top of the meandering ownership, long before such a strategy in general was advisable, the razback bakes went off with worse and worse shots and lacked six of their final 10 from the field. If Pitino’s team had been able to connect with one of his countless experiments from a 3-point range in the route, the result of the game on Saturday would probably have been different. But St. Johns missed seven 3s in the last 6:14, including six stones in the last two minutes.

It was too much senselessness for the Red Storm to overcome it: Arkansas 75, St. Johns 66.

A dream time for Pitino and his team had expired.

Michael Cohen covers College football and college basketball for Fox Sports. Follow him on Twitter @Michael_cohen13.

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