LOS ANGELES—Another year, another dose of what could have been for Arizona.
The second-seeded Wildcats dug a big hole against No. 6 Clemson in the first half, managed to climb out of it, but then kept shoveling it back to the Tigers in a 77-72 loss in the NCAA Tournament Sweet 16 on Thursday night. in Los Angeles.
UA (27-9) lost its third consecutive Sweet 16 appearance due to abysmal performance from the 3-point line, with the leading scorer shooting 5 of 28. caleb love Missed all nine triples on 5 of 18 attempts from the field. The Wildcats shot 37.3 percent and had only three players score in double figures, falling to 0-6 when fewer than four scored 10 points.
jaden bradley Led UA with 18 points off the bench, including 16 in the second half Omar Ballo Love had 15 points and 15 rebounds and joined 13 starters. Kylan Boswell, Keshad Johnson And pelle larson A combined 6 out of 23 left the field.
After trailing 39–31 at halftime, Arizona went on a 12–4 run to tie the game at 43 by making five of six shots and forcing three Clemson turnovers. The Wildcats took their first lead at 46-45 on a Love layup and that woke the Tigers up.
by a 3 jack clark jr Gave them the lead again, which they increased to 53-48 after some time. UA tied it at 56 with 9:55 remaining on back-to-back trips to the line. Bradley, but then Clemson scored five consecutive times, including a bank-in 3 bye ian schieffelin,
Arizona was the only scoring line after the hot start, with the Wildcats missing 18 of 19 shots. Yet Clemson’s lead was only seven. Johnson ended his field goal drought by hitting a 3 to put UA within 65-61 with 4:21 left.
A Bradley dunk made it 66–63 with 3:26 remaining, as Clemson matched UA’s cold shooting, missing seven in a row. Larson had a 3 to tie with 2:47 left, but it was off, and then PJ Hall Two free throws were made, the teams traded inside the basket and the Tigers scored on a back-cut after a timeout to make the score 72–67 with 1:05 remaining.
Bradley drained his second 3 with 49.4 seconds remaining to make the score 72–70, but Clemson had one final answer when chase the hunter Driven, reversed and was fouled. He made free throws to get it back to five, and after Love scored on a runner the Wildcats fumbled the inbounds and allowed dillon hunter To get a freebie for the clinching score.
Arizona got off to as bad a start as it could, missing its first six shots and turning it over three times before scoring. Clemson took advantage of a double-digit lead with 11:18 left in the first half and increased it to 13. Chauncey Wiggins 3 (away from UA turnover) and prompting tommy lloyd To call timeout 27–14 with 7:19 in the half.
The Wildcats took a 6–0 lead by driving and drawing fouls, and the Tigers scored twice in a row to get within 31–24 with 5:10 remaining. Another UA push highlighted by a pair of Bellow dunks cut the deficit to six in the final minute, before Clemson made its first foul shot of the game and Love hit a long 3 airball before the half ended.
