8B
SPORTS
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
FRIDAY, MARCH 16, 2007
Amanda Sellers/KANSAN
(Above) Roderick Stewart high fives fans before open practice in the United Center on Thursday afternoon. The team practiced for 40 minutes with shooting and dribbling drills. The Jayhawks will take on the Niraag Eagles at 6:10 p.m. Friday.
(Left) Darell Arthur throws up a shot during open practice Thursday afternoon in the United Center. The Jayhawks and Coach Bill Bill said previous bad luck in the tournament was not on their minds and they were prepared to play a strong game.
(Below) Roddrick Stewart takes a shot while assistant coach Danny Manning watches practice.
BASKETBALL (CONTINUED FROM 1B)
Wright said that he didn't feel more pressure playing in his home-town, but that he did keep high expectations for himself.
effort to not get bogged down with friends.
"I feel like I can handle a lot more, not necessarily than other people on the team, but I do put a lot of pressure on myself," he said. "Being from Chicago, there was a lot of attention on me, and I felt that it was on me to make something happen."
of walk-on fame, was joking around with junior guard Jeremy Case in the locker room while the media swarmed the other players.
Minutes for Spoon?
Junior guard Brad Witherspoon,
"I just can't wait to get a tournament game under my belt," Witherspoon joked.
Several national analysts are picking the layahwaks as their choice to win it all this year, but Wednesday night Kansas got the nod from an unorthodox newsman: comedian Steven Colbert. During his show, "The Colbert Report," he picked his
One pundit's prediction:
Final Four, which included Texas and Texas A&M, because President Bush is from Texas, Notre Dame, because the Fighting Irish have Jesus on their side. He tapped Kansas as his fourth selection because the name of the school has the letters NSA in it, so the Jayhawks are likely affiliated with the National Security Administration.
Kansan senior sportswriter Michael Phillips can be contacted at mphillips@okansan.com.
>> MARCH MADNESS
— Edited by Katie Sullivan
First round grabs attention
Tournament kicks off nationwide with some close calls
South Regional
LOUISVILLE 78
STANFORD 58
LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) — Louisville did just fine in its old Kentucky home. Stanford seemed all too eager to flee back to the West Coast.
Playing at Rupp Arena — home to archrival Kentucky — Louisville got 16 points from both Edgar Sosa and David Padgett. Sixth-seeded Louisville bolted to a 41-13 lead in front of a highly partisan crowd.
Earl Clark and Derrick Character each had 12 points for Louisville (24-9), which was playing less than 80 miles from its campus.
Brook Lopez led 11th-seeded Stanford (18-13) with 18 points.
The Cardinals will meet Texas A&M in the second round.
TEXAS A&M 68,
PENN 52
LEXINGTON, Ky. (AP) _ Acie Law scored 20 points and the third-seeded Aggies got two key dunks from Joseph Jones and a game-clinching 3-pointer from Dominique Kirk to advance past upset minded Penn.
Jones tied the game at 39 with a thundering dunk at the 11-minute mark, then added another dunk less than a minute later to give Texas A&M (26-6) the lead for good.
Penn opened the second half with a 21-6 run. Ibrahim Jaaber had a three-point play to tie the game at 37, then made a short jumper to give Penn its first and only lead.
Mark Zoller had 19 points for the Quakers (22-9).
East Regional
GEORGETOWN 80
BELMONT 55
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. (AP)
— Jessie Sapp scored a career-high 20 points and Jeff Green added 15 to help second-seeded Georgetown get the win.
Sapp made a career-high four 3-pointers for the Hoyas (27-6), who advanced to the second round for the second straight year and will
renew a one-time Big East rivalry Saturday when they face seventh-seeded Boston College.
Roy Hibbert added 10 points and 13 rebounds for Georgetown, which won its 16th in 17 games by snapping Belmont's seven-game winning streak and dealing the Bruins their second straight lopsided loss in the tournament.
Andrew Preston had 14 points for Belmont (23-10).
BOSTON COLLEGE 84 TEXAS TECH 75
WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. (AP)
— Sean Marshall scored 21 points and Boston College rallied to knock Bob Knight and Texas Tech out of the NCAA tournament.
Marshall had 15 points in the second half. Tyrese Rice added 26 points for the sevent-seeded Eagles (21-11). Jared Dudley had 19 points, helping BC win its tournament opener for the fourth straight season.
Martin Zeno scored 21 points for the Red Raiders (21-13).
The loss ended a season of highs and lows for Texas Tech, which had beaten Kansas and Texas A&M this year but also had some puzzling losses along the way. The Red Raiders made Knight the winningest coach in Division I men's history in January, but also had a five-game losing streak later that month that put their tournament hopes in jeopardy.
WASHINGTON STATE 70,
ORAL ROBERTS 54
SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Kyle Weaver stole an inbounds pass beneath his own basket and dunked to barely beat the halftime buzzer — and what a momentum swing for Washington State.
Reserve Ivory Clark scored 19 points and Weaver had 10 points, eight rebounds and four assists, and third-seeded Washington State (26-7) won its first NCAA game in 24 years. The Cougars will play the winner of George Washington-Vanderbilt in the second round.
Ken Tutt scored 10 of his 19 points in the first half for Oral Roberts (23-11).
Midwest Regional
MARYLAND 82
DAVIDSON 70
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) - D.J.
Strawberry waited three years to get Maryland back into the NCAA tourn-
ment. His patience paid off.
Strawberry, son of former major league slugger Darryl, had 12 points and Mike Jones scored 17 to help the Terrapins hang on for an 82-70 win over Davidson on Thursday. Reserve forward Bambale Osby added 11 points and played a key role in sparking an 11-4 run that put the Terps ahead 69-63 with 7:27 remaining.
It came as no surprise that Curry and Strawberry were dominant for their teams — both are sons of famous athletes. Curry's father is Dell Curry, the former NBA 3-point shooter expert.
Maryland will face No. 5 seed Butler on Saturday, with the winner advancing to St. Louis.
Maryland (25-8) overcame an eight-point second-half deficit and outscoored the Wildcats 24-11 over the final 10 minutes to advance to the second round for the 20th time in school history.
Freshman guard Stephen Curry scored 30 points for Davidson (29-5) before fouling out with 21 seconds left.
Campbell hit three 3-pointers, his only baskets of the game, to spark a 17-0 run and help the Bulldogs get the win in the first round.
Fifth-seeded Butler (28-6), tournament-tested with six tournaments in 11 years, set a school record for victories in a season.
Brandon Johnson scored 11 points for Old Dominion (24-9), which had won 12 of 13 games.
BUFFALO, N.Y. (AP) _ When Butler needed a spark, Pete Campbell delivered.
A. J. Graves led Butler with 18 points.
BUTLER 57,
OLD DOMINION 46
》 MARCH MADNESS
BY JIM O'CONNELL ASSOCIATED PRESS
Associated Press
Tournament opens to fanfare
That matched the total for the entire first round last year and was double the total for the first two days of the 2005 tournament.
Associated Press — The lack of offense on the first day of the NCAA tournament was downright offensive as four losing teams failed to break the 50-point mark.
Marquette, George Washington, Weber State and Old Dominion all failed to hit half-a hundred in losing by average of 21 points. All four of the teams came into the tournament averaging between 72 and 70 points.
Only Virginia Commonwealth's victory over Duke and Xavier's win over Brigham Young, both by the score 79-77, were decided by less than nine points. Vanderbilt's 77-44 win over George Washington was the biggest of the blowouts.
Young blood
It definitely wasn't a day of nail-biters.
Freshmen have been in the headlines all season, so it made sense
PA
that one of them came up with the first big performance of the NCAA tournament.
Stephen Curry of Davidson had 30 points in the Wildcats' 82-70 first-round loss to Maryland.
Second only to Kevin Durant of Texas among the nation's freshmen in scoring, Curry kept 13th-seeded Davidson in the game until the final minutes.
Durant, who plays Friday night against New Mexico State, averaged 25.6 points this season, while Curry, the son of former NBA guard Dell Curry, averaged 21.2. They were the only freshmen among the top 30 scorers in the country.
Free throws
The 6-foot-1 Curry was 9-for-21 from the field and 7-for-7 from the free throw line.
Duke's 79-77 loss to Virginia Commonwealth, the Blue Devils' first in the first round since 1996, featured an uncharacteristic performance at the free throw line.
"He's for real," Maryland coach Gary Williams said. "I told him after the game, 'You could play anywhere."
Duke, which entered the game shooting 69.2 percent at the line, went 20-for-32 (62.5 percent) against the Rams. Sophomore point guard Greg Paulus, who finished with 25 points, went 6-for-11. He entered the game shooting 78.6 percent at the line.
The Blue Devils, who end the season with four straight losses, had reached the round of 16 the last nine years, the longest current streak.
Sour streak
Penn's 68-52 loss to Texas A&M was the Quakers' ninth straight in the NCAA tournament, a streak that dates to a second-round loss to Florida in 1994.
The longest streak is held by Murray State at 11 in a row, from a second-round loss to Kansas in 1988 through last season. North Carolina A&T has also lost nine straight (1982-1995) and Holy Cross, which plays Southern Illinois on Friday, has dropped eight straight from a regional final loss to LSU in 1953 to 2003.
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