The Lunatic was very critical of Auburn leading into the tournament. This is because of some of the things that ex-coach Bruce Pearl said about Miami (OH) and the fact that it seemed inappropriate that he was advocating for his ex-team to make the tournament, especially when it is his son who is now the head coach at Auburn (which also feels a little shady that he basically left at a time that allowed him to hand the keys over to his son)

I think the Lunatic’s criticisms were fair, especially considering that as the tournament got closer, even Bruce Pearl started trying to change the narrative that Miami (OH) at 31-0 now belongs in the tournament if they lose in the MAC tournament.

But the Lunatic is sympathetic to his friend Karma – he believes in being fair to people. You can’t just talk about the bad and ignore the good. The Lunatic also believes in second chances (of which you have about 6 hours to get your second chance picks).

And so Auburn deserves some credit for how they have handled not making the tournament. Which leads us to the NIT. I might say more about it next week as the semi-finals kick-off and I have a limited time to blog before the Sweet 16 regathers my attention. There are a whole bunch of things from player eligibility and post-season tournaments that I would love to address if there was only more time and I wasn’t always exhausted.

But here is the core NIT issue. No one wants to play in it. For many major conference teams, it is NCAA Tournament or bust. This is short-sided to me for two reasons. One is the business model – the NCAA gets revenue from the NIT tournament – I think I saw somewhere that its net revenue was around $3.5 million. That is certainly not a lot compared to the NCAA tournament championship – but it is certainly a profitable tournament for college sports. It won’t exist much longer if teams decide not to play in it – which feels like college basketball is breaking their contracts.

Second is the competitive nature – it is an opportunity to play more basketball against teams you normally don’t play. You might see different styles of play. Players get the opportunity to learn in a low-pressure environment. It shouldn’t probably go unnoticed that last year Nebraska played and won the Crown tournament – and this year they are playing in the Sweet 16. You get to keep playing and practicing basketball for two to three weeks. That should only be helping your program get better.

The NIT even changed the eligibility rules to allow more power conference teams a chance to play (presumably because they want more of them and the power conferences complained about access because of automatic bids to mid-major regular season champions who lost in their conference tournament). Well, the NCAA removed that protection to the mid-majors and instituted a new rule.

There are now 16 exempt bids – the SEC and ACC get two exempt bids, and then the conferences with the 12 best computer ratings each get one exempt team – the Big 10, Big 12 and Big East used to also get 2 but those now go to the Crown tournament thanks to their TV agreements with FOX. Still, if I understand it correctly, that means those conferences have 9 guaranteed spots into the NIT.

And then you get Virginia Tech saying they are not going to play in the postseason before the NCAA field even is announced. And then one by one, the dominos start to fall. This year, it even broke into the mid-majors as Belmont declined a bid because their head coach took a job with a struggling power conferences team and then their players entered the transfer portal – likely to follow him.

So after the NCAA bent the rules to guarantee home games and extra spots to the power conferences, you know who actually showed up.

• Oklahoma State (Big 12) – who lost at home to Davidson
• Wake Forest (ACC) – who beat Navy at home before losing to Illinois State at home in the second round
• California (ACC) – who beat UIC at home before losing to St. Joseph’s at home.
• Auburn (SEC)

They could have taken their ball and gone home like so many other power conference teams did. But they decided to play. And they have played well! They beat South Alabama and Seattle last week, and last night they beat Nevada to make the semi-finals next week where they will be playing Illinois State at historic Hinkle Fieldhouse in Indianapolis. The other semi-final next Thursday will be New Mexico vs. Tulsa.

They decided to play basketball instead of being upset that they didn’t make the tournament. And they have been winning. And now they are the clear favorites to win the NIT in Indianapolis (where they will play in the same city just a couple days before the Final 4).

Winning often leads to more winning. And the Auburn coaching staff, players and administration all did the right thing to give him themselves the opportunity to get some momentum going into next season. The fact that Auburn simply showed up when everyone else is quitting on the season deserves some respect. The fact that they are winning those games deserves even more respect.

And if they can win two more games next week, they will get to call themselves champions. You can say that the NIT championship means nothing. But when you are there on opening day and they are raising a banner to the roof of your stadium because of what you did, it certainly is a moment that those players can be proud of for the rest of their lives. Most people might not remember who won the NIT in 2026. But if they win two more games, they will write themselves into the history of their school.

Of course that might not happen, they first have to beat Illinois State (23-12) and then beat either New Mexico (26-10) or Tulsa (29-7). They might be mid-major teams, but they are strong teams who also want to finish their season on a winning note. But Auburn has the Lunatic’s respect – because they are there to represent their school, which is what college sports is supposed to be about.

Good luck to all four teams in the NIT next week – and thank you to those teams to keeping the traditions of college basketball alive.

It is a tradition here at the Stomp the Lunatic blog, including a sad year when I was so sleep-deprived that I accidentally copied an old version. But since it is already 10:40 pm on the Wednesday before the Sweet 16, it is time.

Here are the top 10 reasons to do the Second Chance Pool!!!!!

• 10) Your chances for a perfect bracket disappeared after the first game when TCU beat Ohio State and so you want a second chance to achieve perfection.
• 9) You always wanted to pick teams by flipping a coin and figured that with 12 of the 16 teams being the top seeds, all the remaining games were probably 50/50 games to pick anyways.
• 8) You were so impressed that 6 Big 10 teams made the Sweet 16 that you decided to pick an all Big 10 Final Four in Indianapolis
• 7) After all the favorites winning in the first two rounds, you know that March will strike back this weekend with massive chaos leading to #5 St. John’s, #9 Iowa, #11 Texas and #6 Tennessee upsetting the favorites to head to Indianapolis.
• 6) Because there are no pools on who will win the next 3 weeks of Jeopardy, and after watching an episode, you can’t get any of the questions correct – so you need an easier game to play.
• 5) Realizing that 19 of the 21 last national champions have had blue in their logos, you are sure that Duke, Illinois, Arizona and Michigan are guaranteed to play each other for the title.
• 4) You realize that your daughter is beating you by picking her favorite mascots so you figure if you can’t beat her, you should join her.  Then you spend the next couple hours debating whether a Blue Devil or Red Storm would win in a mascot battle.
• 3) You did so badly in your original picks, and you heard that someone once won the Upset pool by picking teams by geography, so you put up a map of the United States, blindfold yourself, and throw a dart at the map so you can pick the schools closest to the city where your dart lands.
• 2) It is another – and more importantly, it is the last chance in 2026 to Stomp the Lunatic!!!
• 1) It is absolutely FREE!!!!

That’s right – your entry fee already covers your Second Chance Pool entry – and so there is absolutely no good reason not to do the Second Chance Pool. You even have all Thursday afternoon to do them since the games don’t start until 7:10 pm EST. And with the Lunatic going with his 8^th reason to pick only Big 10 teams in the Final Four, it should be incredibly easy this year to thoroughly stomp him.

In fact, here are the Lunatic’s entire Second Chance bracket:

Everyone deserves a second chance – but you still have to take that second chance to win! Good luck to everyone in Stomping the Lunatic (a second time)!

One of the big stories before the tournament was the loss of Alabama’s second leading scorer Aden Holloway due to a drug arrest. The Lunatic mentioned that he did not know what Karma had planned for the Crimson Tide – it could be a punishment for the team, or it could be simply an opportunity for someone else to be the star.

On Sunday, Karma spoke loud and clear – the opportunity had been created for others. And multiple players on the Crimson Tide took the stage.

The Lunatic had wanted to switch over to the second half after watching the end of the UCLA vs UConn game. And he turned over to a game where the Crimson Tide were beating Texas Tech 49-25 at halftime. Do you realize how hard it is to stay awake to watch a game at 11:30 pm when you are already sleep deprived and you find out the game is a 24 point demolition. So without a box score and a replay I couldn’t tell you much of what happened.

Alabama supposedly lost their biggest threat from three-point range. So against the talented Texas Tech team, Latrell Wrightsell drilled 6 of 9 three pointers to score 24 points and Houston Mallette came off the bench to hit 5 of 7 three pointers for 15 more points on their way to dancing their way to the Sweet 16 with a 90-65 victory.

But here is the most impressive piece. Texas Tech averaged 80.4 points per game, shooting 39.3 percent from three-point range. The Crimson Tide have never really been known for their defense. So imagine the Lunatic’s surprise as the Red Raiders scored over 15 points less than their season average and only hit 4 of their 25 three pointers.

There are not many teams that could lose a starter that averages almost 17 points per game, play against a fellow top 20 team, and not only shoot better from three-point range and play a suffocating defense that would hold their opponents to 15 points less than their season average.

Alabama lost their second best scorer and appear to have become a more complete team that can still score at will but now can also defend. I don’t know if that will be enough to beat the Wolverines on Friday, but to be honest, that is exactly what the Tide want – the Lunatic thought the big, physical team from the Big 12 would be too much to handle and Alabama won by 25. So they certainly want the Lunatic to think Michigan is too strong to repeat that performance. Doubt the capabilities of the Crimson Tide at your own risk – they put together their most complete game of the season on Sunday night – who knows how far this team can go if they can continue to play this well.

Congratulations to Alabama on proving people wrong and continuing to become a better team amongst all the distractions.

With the flurry of close basketball games on Sunday – and the fact that they went all the way until midnight, I did miss out of a couple things that were worth blogging about – so while I could be wasting my time creating the handicapping for the Sweet 16 games, I felt catching up on a few things would be more fun.

With 8:34 left in the first half of the Florida vs Iowa game, the Lunatic was likely watching the exciting ending of the Tennessee vs. Virginia game. And I missed a moment that might have redefined the entire tournament. Since then, I have seen it multiple times and changed my opinion multiple times.

The Hawkeyes had jumped out to a 19-13 lead when Florida’s Alex Condon missed a shot from just outside the lane. Iowa’s Alvaro Folgueiras jumped in and grabbed the defensive rebound. And then, Condon came in from behind him and grabbed at the ball. As the two players fought for control, the referees blew the whistle and were getting ready to call a jump ball.

After the whistle blew, Condon made a powerful swing that lifted and slammed Folgueiras and the ball to the ground, and then Folgueiras created a fist and appeared to punch Condon while they were both on the ground. The coaches had to come onto field to separate the potential brawl that was brewing and then started having words themselves. Tensions were super high as the referees reviewed what happened to figure out any discipline.

The replay did show that Folgueiras’ punch never landed – in fact, the announcers started to debate if he was trying to punch the ball out of Condon’s hands as if he was a safety trying to cause a fumble in a football game.

I think by the letter of the law, Folgueiras should have been ejected and there is an argument that Condon should have been as well. But I am actually glad the referees ended up simply giving them both dead ball technicals.

I think the argument that Folgueiras was trying to punch the ball out is ridiculous. Lets say that he didn’t hear the whistle (which would be crazy since the whistles were non-stop at this point). But how would punching the ball secure the rebound – that would just cause the ball to roll away – which seems like a crazy choice when you currently have your arms wrapped around the ball. After watching it multiple times, it looked like he wanted to retaliate and thought better of it at the last second. He wasn’t trying to punch the ball – he was trying to pull his punch.

And Alex Condon isn’t innocent in this. Lets say that he didn’t hear the whistle (which is less crazy but it sure didn’t seem like a coincidence that he tackled Folgueiras at the moment the whistles blew). The argument I have heard is he was trying to pull the ball away and was so strong that he flipped him to the ground. That is ridiculous as well – if he did that movement and successfully got only the ball, he would have still fallen to the ground and got called for travelling. His intent was clear – it was to throw the Hawkeye to the ground.

I could probably make an argument that Condon’s actions deserved a Flagrant 2, but honestly, a Flagrant 1 seems like the right answer. I could make a better argument that Folgueiras deserved a Flagrant 2 for fighting – just because he didn’t initiate it doesn’t change the punishment. But at the end, he didn’t follow through so if anything, Condon physically hurt him more than vice versa.

So, I eventually came to the conclusion that both players deserved the same punishment – and so if that feels like a Flagrant 1 for Condon, it is also a Flagrant 1 for Folgueiras. I think that is actually where the refs landed as well. They didn’t want to eject Condon and since Folgueiras didn’t land the punch, they didn’t want to eject him either. I don’t like rough play so I would have been good with multiple ejections, but I think the refs got it right.

Regardless, it still might have been the biggest call of the tournament. If Folgueiras had been ejected for fighting, he would not have been there at the end of the game to hit the three-pointer from the corner that won the game for the Hawkeyes. And of course, Condon also made big plays for the Gators – so it would have been a different game if he also was gone. Regardless, if Florida had survived because Folgueiras had not been there to hit the game winner, the Gators certainly have the talent to win four more games and repeat as champions. So while no one might have known at the time – they probably were simply trying to not have the referee’s decision shape the result. But it might have reshaped the entire tournament.

We will never know – maybe if they had been ejected, someone else would have been the hero for the Hawkeyes. At the end of the day, I think the right call was made but I am sure that if I was a Gators’ fan, I might feel differently about the controversy.

First, I feel like a bad fan, because in my excitement that Purdue beat Miami to make it to the Sweet 16, I missed a relatively major milestone.

Congratulations to Purdue’s coach Matt Painter, who on Sunday won his 500th game as the head coach of the Boilermakers. When asked about becoming only the 4th Big 10 coach behind Tom Izzo, Bob Knight and his mentor Gene Keady to win 500 wins at a Big 10 school, he responded with the same humility and honesty that he has throughout his time at Purdue – it was all about his players.

“The one thing that gets lost at Purdue, because we don’t sign McDonald’s All Americans, is that our players are really good,” he said according to a USA Today article. “These guys have put in — I know coaches talk about it — but they’ve put in so much in all areas to be the best that they can be. And that’s how you end up getting a lot of victories, because you have really good players that are committed.”

I remember that after Purdue lost to FDU as a 1 seed there was a lot of grumbling that he needed to be fired like UNC just did to Hubert Davis – I am so thankful that the Purdue administration was smarter than that. The Boilers certainly probably don’t keep Braden Smith, Trey Kaufman-Renn and Fletcher Loyer together for four years without the environment that Matt Painter has created.

The thing that amazes me the most is that you can see that the future remains bright. I remember being sad when Robbie Hummel hurt his knee because I thought they were so talented that might be the Boilers only chance at making the Final Four and with the injury, it was gone. Then, Carson Edwards almost shot us into the Final Four before Virginia’s amazing comeback. Then, there was Jaden Ivey. Of course, we can’t forget watching these seniors with Zach Edey making the championship game. Now Smith, Kaufman-Renn and Loyer are looking to make their own history as they seem to break any Purdue school record that exists. It would be easy to think this is the last chance. But then you look at some of the glimpses of success that CJ Cox, Gicarri Harris, Omer Mayer, Jack Benter and Daniel Jacobsen have had through the season, and you realize that the future is in good hands – and that is even before looking at the 2026 recruiting class.

And while Painter will rightfully give the players all the accolades for that success, the unspoken truth is that Purdue’s continued success is due to Matt Painter being an incredible coach. There will always be that group that will say he can’t be truly elite unless he wins a National Championship, but regardless of what happens this year or in the future, there is nothing Matt Painter needs to prove. Purdue is lucky that Matt Painter is their coach and hopefully he will get to continue to do that as long as he wants to coach.

So the Lunatic is sorry for missing this milestone. But he certainly wants to thank Matt Painter for all he does for Purdue.

On a different note, the Lunatic sadly has to mention another moment – because he is afraid of karma. After the Miami game, CBS interviewed Fletcher Loyer and he gave a very polished answer but then as he left the cameras showed him pointing to the crowd and giving the “U Down” signal likely to troll some Miami fans.

I totally missed it but my son noticed it right away. Then a friend and fellow Purdue alum sent me an email about it. I hoped it would go away but sure enough my Purdue feeds kept showing it.

So, I would feel like a hypocrite if I don’t point it out. I talk about all the things I like about the Purdue program that it would be wrong to ignore when they do something I don’t agree with. I care about sportsmanship and so it breaks my soul that a player I love to watch would troll a fan base after a win.

On one point, I agree with something – if Loyer hadn’t been interviewed, that moment probably never gets seen. These players are wrestling each other to the ground over loose balls and trash talking each other for 40 minutes while fans are screaming horrible things at them. It has to be hard to turn that competitiveness off once the game is over.

Charlie said that shows how tough a competitor Loyer is – he loves it. But I think this is my problem. You see a player like Steph Curry give the night-night sign after making a big three-pointer, and young kids think – that is so awesome, I am going to do it too. Loyer isn’t the first person to show the U Down sign to Miami fans and he certainly won’t be the last.

But while I know that I am probably in the minority, sportsmanship matters to me. And I can’t point out what others do if I don’t call my Boilers out when they do it. So, while I realize that all of this is now just part of the game, the Lunatic does wish it wasn’t. We can compete like champions on the court, and not have to kick the team when they are already down.

I will end with a non-Purdue story that ties in. At the end of the St. John’s vs Kansas game, as Dylan Darling hit the layup to send St. John’s to the Sweet 16 and break the hearts of Kansas fans, they showed a video of the St. John’s bench of everyone but one person jumping in celebration. That one person was Hall of Fame coach Rick Pitino, who looked stoic as the shot went in as he calmly started walking over to shake Bill Self’s hand.

There were certainly things that Pitino has done over his career, especially the recruiting violations that got him kicked out of Louisville, that the Lunatic didn’t agree with. But what Pitino did is how I was taught – you play hard, you win the game, and then win or lose, you shake your opponents hand out of sportsmanship and respect.

In the era of social media and how much trash talking has embraced sports, that might be leaving the sport as the old guard coaches will eventually retire. The Lunatic hopes that is not the case.

It is one of the things that I hate about sports. If you have any success, you suddenly expect it every year. And if you don’t get it, everyone wants you to fire the coach.

Immediately after losing to VCU, the stories calling for Davis to be fired started. Tonight, the fans and media got their wish. So lets look at how bad of a coach Davis is.

In five seasons, he went 125-54, won an ACC regular season championship, led them to the NCAA tournament in 4 of the 5 seasons including a NCAA Sweet 16 in 2024 and the NCAA championship game in 2022. He never had a losing record in the ACC, and the year they didn’t go to the tournament was their worst record at 20-13.

This year, they were ranked 11th in the country at 17-4 when they lost leading scoring Caleb Wilson to a bone fracture in his left hand and center Henri Veesaar to a lower back injury. Veesaar would eventually make it back on the court, but Wilson’s season was over, and the Tar Heels stumbled down the stretch.

And then of course, they lose a 19 point lead to VCU and his career at North Carolina is over.

While there are certainly some exceptions, most teams can’t lose a player who averages 19.8 points per game and continue to contend for a national championship. But apparently, that is the expectation at North Carolina.

We complain that Cinderella is dead because of NIL and the transfer portal. But when Cinderella does pull off an upset, that is the point that you fire your coach.

I don’t know the exact number because this was from 2025, but the number of teams that have won more games from 2020-2025 than UNC was 12 (with 3 others tied with them). I will have to do some more research when it isn’t so late – but most schools don’t have the success that Davis had with UNC.

You can say – but North Carolina is different. That might be true. But as I have written in past years, Indiana fired their coach because they weren’t making enough Final Fours. Since that decision, this is now the 8th year out of 10 that Indiana has missed the NCAA Tournament.

The Tar Heels have lots of resources, so maybe they will get a star coach who will take them to the promised land. But they also certainly could fall apart……

It was probably good that the late games were not as interesting – both UConn and Alabama ran away to finish off the 16 teams that will advance to next Thursday and Friday.

I will probably have more to blog about it over the upcoming week, but since it is late, we will simply congratulate the leaders!

Matt Reilly is our leader in both pools – he got 14 of the Sweet 16 teams correct to take the lead.

In the Standard Pool, he is followed by a 6 way tie for 2nd between Joe Chapman, Mary-Rian Bradley, Joseph Laucius, Al Lester, Bo Luy and his other bracket at 530. Just 40 points behind in a tie for 8th are Heath Lindvall, both of Alan Miller’s brackets, Eric Morton, David Caldwell, Sam Franklin, Rob Bradley, Jennifer Ogle, Mark Schumaker, Dan Fischer, Kennedy Urban, and Earl McKnight.

In the Upset Pool, our top 5 places are the following – Matt leads at 234 points, Lochlan Middlebrook is in 2nd at 213 points, Tony Wilson is in 3rd at 211 points, Al Lester is in 4th at 204 points, and Mark Walsh is in 5th at 203 points.

If you were one of the people who picked Florida and had to tear your bracket up thanks to the Iowa Hawkeyes hitting a three pointer from the corner with 4 seconds left, don’t despair. That is because the Second Chance Pool is ready and available – simply go to the Login link and it will take you to the entry form.

Everyone deserves a second chance!!!! And in the Stomp the Lunatic contest, this second chance is free – it is already included in your entry fees. So, there is no reason to miss out on taking advantage of your second chance.

Good luck to everyone in continuing to Stomp the Lunatic!!!!

Some will try to argue that Texas or Iowa are Cinderellas, being an 11 seed and 9 seed. But the Lunatic feels that you can’t be from a power conference and be a Cinderella. They certainly deserve tons of credit for pulling off upsets to get to the Sweet 16. But the Lunatic holds the term Cinderella in reserve for the mid-major teams that don’t have the same financial resources that schools from the SEC and Big 10 have.

After St. Louis, VCU and High Point went down (and Gonzaga – although it is hard to call a 3 seed Cinderella), the last mid-major standing was #9 seed Utah State. And when the Arizona Wildcats took an 18 point lead with 15 minutes to play, it certainly looked like Cinderella’s magic was done.

But Utah State would make a run – they would cut the lead all the way down to 4 points with 6 1/2 to play when Drake Allen hit a three-pointer.

With a little over 2 minutes left and Arizona draining the shot clock, they got the ball into Brayden Burries in the corner. But Utah State’s defender closed out great and forced Burries to take the ball back out to the three point line. He kept dribbling further and further away from the basket trying to get just a little bit of space, and finally launched the ball high in the air from an NBA three-point range, and the ball goes in to give the Wildcats a 9 point lead.

Utah State would get a few chances from three-point range to try to cut the lead, but none of them would go in. Arizona advances to the Sweet 16, and the last mid-major team has fallen.

The early evening of basketball is keeping the Lunatic busy. I finish the blog of one game that is exciting, and the next one then tries to top it. It once again proves that the Lunatic can not handicap games.

I mentioned in my handicapping blog that I had seen this before. I mentioned how while Duke blows out teams, TCU had not been beating by double digits very often and then the Blue Devils go on a 30-10. Florida blows teams out, and so even though Iowa has experience against tough teams, expect Florida to run away like Duke did.

Except Iowa came to play – the Hawkeyes ruled the first half and took a 2 point lead into halftime. And then the Hawkeyes came out of the locker room on fire. 6 minutes into the half, Cooper Koch hit a three pointer to force the Gators to call timeout as Iowa suddenly had a 12 point lead.

The Gators used the timeout well – as they started their spark. And around the 7 minute mark, Isaiah Brown and Alex Condon hit back-to-back dunks to give the Gators a 60-58 lead. One had to figure that this was when the defending champions would run away.

Except they didn’t. With about 4 minutes, Iowa’s Cooper Koch hit a three-pointer to give the Hawkeyes a lead. But the Gators would play good defense, get some free throws and have Alex Condon make a layup to give Florida a 3 point lead. With about 2 minutes left, Tavion Banks would cut the lead down to 1 with a nice dunk, only to have the Gators come right back down the court and get a layup from Xaivian Lee.

After running the shot clock down, Florida’s Boogie Fland drove the lane and looked like the Iowa defender hit the ball out of his hands. But Iowa challenged the call, and it was ruled that the ball was last off of Fland. Iowa took advantage of it, by getting the ball to their star, Bennett Stirtz – who drove to the lane and hit a jumper to cut the lead back to 1.

Florida tried to take some time off the clock, but they ended up having to take a long three-pointer, which Thomas Haugh missed, and suddenly, Iowa had a chance to take the lead. Bennett Stirtz drove the lane, was defended well, and Stirtz threw up a wild shot in the lane that missed with 11 seconds. Isaiah Brown would get the defensive rebound and was immediately fouled.

But Brown missed the first free throw. After hitting the second one, Florida called time out to try to set up their defense with a 2 point lead.

Iowa made a nice pass in to Stirtz who caught the ball already at full speed heading down the court, and it looked like he would drive all the way down the court. But once he got near the three-point line, he passed the ball into the corner to Alvaro Folgueiras, who took a step back to make sure both feet were behind the three-point line, and drilled the shot to give the Hawkeyes a one-point lead with 4.5 seconds left.

Xaivian Lee would get the ball on a full sprint and drove all the way down the court with Kael Combs trying to stay in front of him. As Lee got to the basket, Alvaro Folgueiras doubled and both him and Combs jumped to block Lee’s layup. Realizing he had no chance to make it, Lee tried to pass it to Thomas Haugh since that was the man that Folgueiras left to try to block the shot. But the ball hit Haugh’s feet as the buzzer went off. Even if Haugh was able to catch the wild pass, there would have been no time to get a shot off.

And in a tournament where the favorites seem to be advancing, the first #1 team falls in the Round of 32 as the #9 seed Iowa Hawkeyes knock off the defending champions to advance to the Sweet 16 in Houston.

With about 8 1/2 minutes left, Tennessee had a lead and on a loose ball heading out of bounds, JP Estrella boxed out Virginia’s Sam Lewis from trying to save it. Lewis didn’t like the contact and shoved Estrella, which earned him a dead-ball technical foul. Tennessee would hit one of the free throws to extend the lead to 8.

And then the Cavaliers rallied. Over the next 4 minutes, Virginia would go on an 11-3 run, ending with Thijs De Ridder hitting a couple free throws after being fouled trying to get a rebound. The teams would start to go back and forth scoring layups, until the 2 minute mark when De Ridder hit a three-pointer from the wing to give Virginia a 71-70 lead.

On the next play, Nate Ament would get fouled and hit both free throws to reclaim the lead for the Volunteers. Virginia tried to get the ball inside with Dailin Hall, but his turnaround jumper in the lane was too strong.

Virginia played tight defense, and forced a loose ball when Avent got trapped along the wing. The ball got blocked into the air, and Bishop Boswell beat Chance Mallory to the ball, with Mallory knocking them both down to the ground for a foul. But Mallory would only hit one of the free throws so Virginia could still tie or take the lead on the next possession with 46 seconds.

Jacan White made a nice drive to the basket, but missed the reverse layup. The ball got tipped up by Virginia but that also missed and then a Tennessee player tried to slap the ball outside. The ball hits another Volunteer in the head, and then it looked like it barely touched the fingers of a Virginia player before rolling out of bounds.

Virginia challenged it, and to be honest, it looked like the ball never was touched by the Virginia player – he completely whiffed trying to catch it. But the referees ruled the video was not inconclusive evidence and that you could not tell if it touched his finger or not. So Tennessee would get the ball.

VIrginia would be forced to foul Ja’Kobi Gillespie, and he calmly drilled both free throws to make it a two-possession game. Chance Mallory made a nice drive to get to the hoop but once again the layup would miss and get hit out of bounds. This time, Virginia would keep it.

The pass with 15 seconds left went to Jacari White for a wide open three pointer in the corner, but White threw up an air-ball that was rebounded by Gillespie. Once again, Gillespie hit both free throws and iced the game for the Volunteers – they will head to the Sweet 16!!!