Big 12 Tournament: Arizona men’s basketball beats Houston to sweep league titles
· Yahoo Sports
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Arizona followed up its regular season championship by claiming the Big 12 Tournament title, knocking off defending champ Houston 79-74 in the title game on Saturday evening in Kansas City.
The top-seeded Wildcats (32-2) became the 13th school to sweep the Big 12 titles, the last three of which reached the NCAA championship game a few weeks later.
Freshmen Brayden Burries and Koa Peat had 21 points each, with Burries scoring 10 in the final three minutes of the first half and icing the game by hitting two fouls shots with 8.3 seconds remaining. Jaden Bradley had 13 points, all in the first half, and briefly went to the locker room to get his left wrist taped but then played the final 14-plus minutes, and Ivan Kharchenkov added 12 for Arizona, which beat Houston (28-6) for the second time in a row after losing its first three meetings with the Cougars under Tommy Lloyd.
Lloyd, who extended his NCAA record for wins in the first five seasons as a head coach to 143, won his sixth overall conference title with the UA. It’s the second time he’s won both the regular season and conference titles, joining the 2021-22 squad.
The UA won despite being eld scoreless for more than seven minutes in the second half, seeing a 15-point lead dwindle to one before recovering and holding on. Arizona made five of six shots to keep Houston behind and made all six free throws in the final 91 seconds, going 23 of 27 for the game.
The UA led 44-36 at halftime, aided by Burries’ late burst. The 44 points were the most by a team in the first half of a Big 12 title game since 2011.
Arizona extended the lead to 51-36 but saw Bradley leave the game and go into the tunnel, wincing in pain after holding his left wrist. Bradley came back to the bench a few minutes later with the wrist and thumb heavily taped and returned with 14:36 to go and the UA still up 15.
But then foul trouble became a huge issue for Arizona. Tobe Awaka got his fourth, Motiejus Krivas his third andPeat his fourth in short succession, forcing the Wildcats to go with a much smaller defense and coinciding with Houston going on a 14-0 run to get within 59-58 with 7:08 remaining. It was only the second run of 10 or more points allowed by the UA this season, the other against Norfolk State in November during garbage time.
The Wildcats missed seven straight shots and turned it over five times during the Cougars’ run. Burries snapped the long scoring drought with a floater and was fouled, making the free throw to get the lead back to four with 6:40 left.
That was the first of five consecutive makes by Arizona, including a banked 3-pointer byKharchenkovand a banked floater by Burries at the end of the shot clock to extend the lead to 73-64 with 2:48 remaining.
Hercy Miller hit a 3 to get the Cougars within six, then after Arizona broke the press Bradley missed a layup and Milos Uzan drained a 3 on the other end to make it 75-72 with 53.8 seconds to go. Peat missed a jumper on the next possession but Krivas pulled down the offensive rebound, was fouled and made both foul shots, and after Houston got two at the line with 13.1 seconds left Burries sank the final two free throws to ice it with 8.3 seconds left.
Arizona scored the game’s first five points before Houston went on a 7-0 run, then it was back-and-forth for the next few minutes. Along the way, though,Awaka picked up two fouls and sat with 13:54 left in the first half.
Bradley was the early offensive catalyst, with eight points including a pair of 3s. But when he went to the bench for a break the Wildcats started to build a lead and get Houston into foul trouble. Chris Cenac Jr. and Emmanuel Sharp both got their second fouls less than a minute apart, Sharp’s on the offensive end, and the UA went on a 6-0 run to lead 22-14.
Krivas got his second foul with 9:10 left before halftime, and Houston’s Milos Uzan joined the 2-foul club with 7:29 to go in the half. Arizona benefited from the whistles by starting 10 for 10 from the line, with Bradley’s 3-point play putting the Wildcats up 29-22.
But then Awaka got his third foul with 4:08 remaining before halftime, moving Peat to the 5 for the rest of the half. And that somehow sparked something in Burries.
After airballing two early 3s and missing 11 straight shots dating back to Thursday’s quarterfinal against UCF, Burries hit four consecutive shots over the final 2:41 to give the Wildcats an 8-point lead at the break.
Arizona now waits to see its NCAA Tournament path. It is expected to be the No. 1 seed in the West Region, opening play Friday in San Diego, with the full bracket getting released Sunday at 3 p.m. PT.