SAN DIEGO — Arizona center Christian Koloko raised his arms over his head and pumped them up and down.
After all that back and forth here Sunday at Viejas Arena, his Wildcats are going to the Sweet 16.
Barely.
First they had to force overtime with a 3-pointer in the final seconds of regulation. Then they had to survive a feisty TCU team that smelled blood and eventually left some of it on the floor.
Final score: 85-80.
No. 1 seed Arizona (33-3) now advances to play Houston in the next round after outscoring TCU 10-5 in the extra period, including six points from sophomore guard Bennedict Mathurin, who finished with 30 for the game. The 7-foot-1 Koloko added 28.
Arizona forced overtime after Mathurin, the Canadian star, swished a 3-point shot near the top of the arc with just under 13 seconds left to tie the score at 75. Arizona guard Dalen Terry then nearly ended the game in dramatic fashion after picking up a loose ball and jamming it in as the final buzzer of regulation sounded. But it was ruled no basket because he didn’t shoot it in time, sending the game into the extra period.
“Ben’s not afraid of the moment,” Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd said afterward. “And he’s a special player who has an ability to rise it up another level when needed. And he has that clutch gene. I mean, I honestly felt really good when he had the ball in his hands there because I knew he was going to shoot a 3.”
Koloko scored the final basket of overtime after Mathurin missed another 3-point try. This time the missed shot caromed toward Koloko, who grabbed the rebound and dunked to put Arizona up 85-80 with about nine seconds left. TCU missed its final two shots after that.
The game featured 11 lead changes, 13 tie scores and blood on the floor in overtime after TCU forward Emanuel Miller got knocked in the head in the paint. At one point in the second half, Arizona led by nine points with 7:52 left. But TCU kept banging back. especially with 6-foot-11 center Eddie Lampkin, who finished with 20 points and 14 rebounds, including 10 on offense.
“It hurt,” TCU guard Mike Miles said. “We deserve to win that game, and we didn’t win.”
He specifically mentioned the final play of regulation, right before Terry of Arizona tried to dunk it before the final buzzer. He appeared to get hip-checked by Arizona, sending him to the floor at midcourt, where the ball came loose for Terry to pick up right before the buzzer. If a foul had been called against Arizona, Miles could have had the opportunity to win the game at the free-throw line with the score tied at 75.
“I wouldn’t say it was not a foul, but it was a foul,” Miles said. “They didn’t call it.”
TCU finishes the season with a 21-13 record after beating Seton Hall Friday in the first round.
“We still felt we should have won the game,” TCU head coach Jamie Dixon said. “We did everything. And we just came up short.”
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George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism