It was a truly wild finish in Oklahoma City. Vanderbilt took their first lead of the game with around 8 minutes to go in the second half – as they got hot from three point range. They held onto that 3 point lead going into the final 4 minutes.

Pryce Sandfort hit two free throws to cut the lead to one, and the Cornhuskers switched their defense to a zone, which seemed to give the Commodores trouble. With about 2 minutes, Berke Buyuktuncel hit a layup to give Nebraska a short-lived lead. That is because Vanderbilt’s Duke Miles drove the baseline and hit AK Okeruke in the corner for a three-pointer to give them back a 2 point lead.

Nebraska would try to retake the lead with a three-pointer from the top of the key by Rienk Mast, but it missed to the left. And the smallest player on the court, the coach’s son Sam Hoiberg got the rebound and hit the layup to tie the game at 70 with about 80 seconds to go.

The back and forth continued. Tyler Tanner for Vanderbilt drove hard to the hoop and hit a well-contested layup to take the lead. So, Hoiberg would drive the lane and tried to tie it back up with a layup. His shot was too strong, but ironically, this time it was Rienk Mast who was there to tie the game with a tip-in lay-up.

So, Vanderbilt runs the shot clock down, and Nebraska plays strong defense making it look like the Commodores would not even get a shot off. They found Chandler Bing in the middle of the lane who quickly shot the ball of the pass, but his floater was too strong, and Nebraska got the rebound with 10 seconds.

Pryce Sandfort rushed the ball down the court along the wing, started to drive to the lane and made a nice pass to a streaking Braden Frager down the center of the lane. Frager would drive hard down the lane, and shoot and acrobatic layup that goes in to give Nebraska a 74-72 lead with just 2 seconds left.

Vanderbilt called time-out and set up one last play. But Nebraska guarded any deep passes well, so the play went to Tyler Tanner, who took a couple dribbles towards the half-court line, and launched a 50 foot shot as the buzzer rang. The ball hit the backboard almost perfectly, hit the front of the rim, rattled around looking like it was going to go in, and an unfortunate bounce watched the ball rattle out and fall harmlessly to the court.

So, in what has been a pretty exciting night of basketball, Nebraska survived and advance to make it to the Sweet 16.