For the first time in four years, the Final Four won’t include UCLA.
Third-seeded Villanova beat the sixth-seeded Bruins 89-69 on Saturday to keep them from the what would have been the fourth-longest consecutive Final Four streak in college basketball history.
The Bruins are one of eight teams that reached three in a row. UCLA holds the record of 10, set from 1967 to 1976 under coach John Wooden, while Cincinnati (1959-1963) and Duke (1988-1992) both had runs of five straight years.
Darren Collison and Alfred Aboya were the only players to appear in all three Final Fours in the run that just ended. The Bruins lost to Florida in the 2006 title game, and to the Gators and Memphis in the semifinals the next two years. Including this year’s first-round win over Virginia Commonwealth and the loss to Villanova, the Bruins are 14-4 in the NCAA tournament since 2006.
till very proud of our team overall, and especially of our seniors and everything they’ve meant to this program. These kids have been in four straight NCAA tournaments, three Final Fours, three PAC-10 championships. So it’s really tough to be saying goodbye to them today from their careers at UCLA.”
The three runs to the Final Four all went through the West Regional. This year there was a cross-country trip and a second-round game against Villanova about 20 miles from its campus.
“It’s obviously an advantage to be in your familiar, backyard surroundings, there’s no question about that,” Howland said. “Whether the game would have been any different if it had been played anywhere else is something we’ll never know. It was played here today. They played great. We didn’t.
“But it is tough. It hasn’t really hit yet to think that those kids are finally done here.”
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SALLIE MAY: Memphis’ Roburt Sallie followed his 10-for-15 effort from 3-point range in an opening-round win over Cal State Northridge by going 3-for-4 in an 89-70 victory over Maryland on Saturday.
The 13-for-19 long-range run in the two games has Sallie shooting 68.4 percent from beyond the arc, just off the top 10 performances in NCAA tournament history, with at least one more game to play.
nth on the list is Darnell Archey of Butler, who went 11-for-16 (68.8 percent) over three games in 2003.
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FOLLOW-UP: Connecticut’s 103-47 win over Chattanooga in the first round on Thursday was the third-largest margin of victory in NCAA tournament history. The Huskies followed that win in more impressive fashion than the two teams above them on the list.
In 1963, Loyola of Chicago beat Tennessee Tech 111-42 for the largest margin, and Kansas beat Prairie View 110-52 in 1998.
M 92-66 on Saturday in the second round.
Loyola, on the way to the national championship, followed its big win with a 61-51 victory over Mississippi State, while Kansas couldn’t sustain any momentum, losing 80-75 to Rhode Island in the second round.
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