Three double-digit seeds won in the first round and two others came close Friday. Third-seeded Georgia Tech beat No. 14 Northern Iowa 65-60 and Ben Jacobson of the Panthers missed a 3-pointer to tie with 3 seconds left. Fourth-seeded Cincinnati beat No. 13 East Tennessee State 80-77 and the Buccaneers missed three chances to score down low in the final seconds and make it a one-point game. It was the second straight year East Tennessee State scared a high seed. It lost 76-73 to second-seeded Wake Forest last season.
STARS
Rodney Carney had a career-high 26 points, including six 3-pointers a school record in an NCAA tournament game in Memphis' 59-43 victory over South Carolina. ... Tony Bobbitt had 15 points, including the game-winning 3-pointer with 16 seconds left, for Cincinnati in an 80-77 victory over East Tennessee State. ... Mario Moore was 6-for-8 from 3-point range and had a career-high 26 points for Vanderbilt in the 71-58 win over Western Michigan. ... Chuck Hayes had 12 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists for Kentucky in a 96-76 win over Florida A&M. ... Ivan McFarlin had 20 points and 10 rebounds for Oklahoma State in a 75-56 victory over Eastern Washington. ... Lionel Chalmers scored 25 points and Romain Sato added 24 for Xavier, which wiped out a 53-39 deficit on the way to an 80-70 victory over Louisville. ... Demario Eddins had a career-high 26 points for UAB in a 102-100 victory over Washington.
PERFECT ROUND
The Atlantic Coast Conference had six teams in the field five seeded fourth or higher and all of them moved on to the second round. The only other league with at least three bids to go unbeaten was the Big 12 with four. SEE YA
The Mountain West was one of five conferences to have three or more teams in the field, but it didn't have one make it to the second round. Air Force, Utah and Brigham Young all lost in the first round. The league was ranked seventh among the 31 conferences by the RPI.
GREAT STREAK
Kentucky's victory over Florida A&M gave the Wildcats a 13-game winning streak in the first round.
EIGHT-NINES
The No. 8 seeds won three of the games against the 9s, the opposite result of what happened last year. The previous four years one of the seeds swept the other, two by each.
BAD RECORD
Monmouth's 85-52 loss to Mississippi State dropped the Northeast Conference to 1-23 all-time in the NCAA tournament. The league's only win was by Robert Morris in a 1983 opening-round game against Georgia Southern.
REMATCH
Mississippi State and Xavier will meet Sunday in the second round. They played on Dec. 13 and Mississippi State won 82-70 at home. SECOND HALF
Eastern Washington did pretty well for the first 20 minutes of its NCAA tournament debut. Then came the second half. Second-seeded Oklahoma State broke a 36-36 halftime tie with a 12-2 run and went on to a 75-56 victory. Alvin Snow, the Big Sky Conference player of the year and the Eagles' leading scorer at 15.2 points per game, missed his first seven shots and didn't score until there was 2:10 left in the game. He finished 1-for-10 from the field and had two points.
SCORING SHOW
UAB's 102-100 victory over Washington was the first double-100 game since UCLA beat Cincinnati 105-101 in overtime in the regional semifinals in 2002. It was the first in regulation since Tulsa beat UCLA 112-102 in the first round in 1994.
FINAL FOUR GET-TOGETHER
Saturday's second-round matchup between Texas and North Carolina has half of last year's Final Four coaches in it. Rick Barnes took the Longhorns to their first Final Four in 56 years, while Roy Williams took Kansas there for the second straight year and fourth time overall. Williams left the Jayhawks to return to his alma mater in April. Both Texas and Kansas lost to Syracuse in New Orleans.
NO RICK
Utah's loss to Boston College was its first NCAA tournament game without Rick Majerus as head coach since 1986. Majerus stepped down in January for health reasons and Kerry Rupp took over as interim coach. Majerus was 9-1 in first-round games with the Utes, who he led to the national championship game in 1998.
SOUR SIXTEEN
The biggest of the underdogs will have to wait another year. Kentucky's 96-76 victory over Florida A&M dropped No. 16 seeds to 0-80 since the field was expanded in 1985.
HOME COOKING
Wisconsin took advantage of playing about an hour from campus, feeding off a pro-Badgers crowd to overcome a 13-point deficit in the second half to beat Richmond 76-64. Kansas also played close to home, beating Illinois-Chicago 78-53 in Kansas City, Mo., also about an hour from its campus. The unlucky second-round opponents for the ''home'' teams are Pittsburgh for Wisconsin and Pacific for Kansas.
THREES
Utah's Nick Jacobson entered the tournament as the second-best 3-point shooter in the field, hitting 45.3 percent. The senior forward struggled from beyond the arc in the Utes' 58-51 loss to Boston College, going 2-for-13 and scoring eight points. FULL 40
Cincinnati coach Bob Huggins got to see all of the Bearcats' 80-77 victory over East Tennessee State. Last season, Huggins and radio announcer Chuck Machock were ejected four minutes into the second half of Cincinnati's 74-69 first-round loss to Gonzaga for arguing a call.
BAD FINISHES
Providence was ranked No. 12 just two weeks ago. The Friars closed the season with a four-game losing streak, the last a 66-58 loss to Pacific. ... Louisville was ranked No. 4 at the end of January. The Cardinals closed the season losing nine of 13, including the 80-70 loss to Xavier.
SPEAKING HONESTLY
''We want to represent the Big Ten as well as we can, but we're kind of in it for ourselves now. We've got to be kind of a selfish team,'' Illinois forward James Augustine.
''I had never experienced that. I wasn't supposed to laugh because I was on national TV, but I heard it in the background. It was a really good feeling,'' Memphis forward Rodney Carney on hearing his name chanted by fans in the Tigers' win over South Carolina.
''You can't really contain him. He's so fast. He's like Michael Vick with the basketball,'' Cincinnati's Field Williams on defending East Tennessee State's Tim Smith.
wil.
[This message was edited by wilheim on March 20, 2004 at 02:14 PM.]
STARS
Rodney Carney had a career-high 26 points, including six 3-pointers a school record in an NCAA tournament game in Memphis' 59-43 victory over South Carolina. ... Tony Bobbitt had 15 points, including the game-winning 3-pointer with 16 seconds left, for Cincinnati in an 80-77 victory over East Tennessee State. ... Mario Moore was 6-for-8 from 3-point range and had a career-high 26 points for Vanderbilt in the 71-58 win over Western Michigan. ... Chuck Hayes had 12 points, 11 rebounds and eight assists for Kentucky in a 96-76 win over Florida A&M. ... Ivan McFarlin had 20 points and 10 rebounds for Oklahoma State in a 75-56 victory over Eastern Washington. ... Lionel Chalmers scored 25 points and Romain Sato added 24 for Xavier, which wiped out a 53-39 deficit on the way to an 80-70 victory over Louisville. ... Demario Eddins had a career-high 26 points for UAB in a 102-100 victory over Washington.
PERFECT ROUND
The Atlantic Coast Conference had six teams in the field five seeded fourth or higher and all of them moved on to the second round. The only other league with at least three bids to go unbeaten was the Big 12 with four. SEE YA
The Mountain West was one of five conferences to have three or more teams in the field, but it didn't have one make it to the second round. Air Force, Utah and Brigham Young all lost in the first round. The league was ranked seventh among the 31 conferences by the RPI.
GREAT STREAK
Kentucky's victory over Florida A&M gave the Wildcats a 13-game winning streak in the first round.
EIGHT-NINES
The No. 8 seeds won three of the games against the 9s, the opposite result of what happened last year. The previous four years one of the seeds swept the other, two by each.
BAD RECORD
Monmouth's 85-52 loss to Mississippi State dropped the Northeast Conference to 1-23 all-time in the NCAA tournament. The league's only win was by Robert Morris in a 1983 opening-round game against Georgia Southern.
REMATCH
Mississippi State and Xavier will meet Sunday in the second round. They played on Dec. 13 and Mississippi State won 82-70 at home. SECOND HALF
Eastern Washington did pretty well for the first 20 minutes of its NCAA tournament debut. Then came the second half. Second-seeded Oklahoma State broke a 36-36 halftime tie with a 12-2 run and went on to a 75-56 victory. Alvin Snow, the Big Sky Conference player of the year and the Eagles' leading scorer at 15.2 points per game, missed his first seven shots and didn't score until there was 2:10 left in the game. He finished 1-for-10 from the field and had two points.
SCORING SHOW
UAB's 102-100 victory over Washington was the first double-100 game since UCLA beat Cincinnati 105-101 in overtime in the regional semifinals in 2002. It was the first in regulation since Tulsa beat UCLA 112-102 in the first round in 1994.
FINAL FOUR GET-TOGETHER
Saturday's second-round matchup between Texas and North Carolina has half of last year's Final Four coaches in it. Rick Barnes took the Longhorns to their first Final Four in 56 years, while Roy Williams took Kansas there for the second straight year and fourth time overall. Williams left the Jayhawks to return to his alma mater in April. Both Texas and Kansas lost to Syracuse in New Orleans.
NO RICK
Utah's loss to Boston College was its first NCAA tournament game without Rick Majerus as head coach since 1986. Majerus stepped down in January for health reasons and Kerry Rupp took over as interim coach. Majerus was 9-1 in first-round games with the Utes, who he led to the national championship game in 1998.
SOUR SIXTEEN
The biggest of the underdogs will have to wait another year. Kentucky's 96-76 victory over Florida A&M dropped No. 16 seeds to 0-80 since the field was expanded in 1985.
HOME COOKING
Wisconsin took advantage of playing about an hour from campus, feeding off a pro-Badgers crowd to overcome a 13-point deficit in the second half to beat Richmond 76-64. Kansas also played close to home, beating Illinois-Chicago 78-53 in Kansas City, Mo., also about an hour from its campus. The unlucky second-round opponents for the ''home'' teams are Pittsburgh for Wisconsin and Pacific for Kansas.
THREES
Utah's Nick Jacobson entered the tournament as the second-best 3-point shooter in the field, hitting 45.3 percent. The senior forward struggled from beyond the arc in the Utes' 58-51 loss to Boston College, going 2-for-13 and scoring eight points. FULL 40
Cincinnati coach Bob Huggins got to see all of the Bearcats' 80-77 victory over East Tennessee State. Last season, Huggins and radio announcer Chuck Machock were ejected four minutes into the second half of Cincinnati's 74-69 first-round loss to Gonzaga for arguing a call.
BAD FINISHES
Providence was ranked No. 12 just two weeks ago. The Friars closed the season with a four-game losing streak, the last a 66-58 loss to Pacific. ... Louisville was ranked No. 4 at the end of January. The Cardinals closed the season losing nine of 13, including the 80-70 loss to Xavier.
SPEAKING HONESTLY
''We want to represent the Big Ten as well as we can, but we're kind of in it for ourselves now. We've got to be kind of a selfish team,'' Illinois forward James Augustine.
''I had never experienced that. I wasn't supposed to laugh because I was on national TV, but I heard it in the background. It was a really good feeling,'' Memphis forward Rodney Carney on hearing his name chanted by fans in the Tigers' win over South Carolina.
''You can't really contain him. He's so fast. He's like Michael Vick with the basketball,'' Cincinnati's Field Williams on defending East Tennessee State's Tim Smith.
wil.
[This message was edited by wilheim on March 20, 2004 at 02:14 PM.]
