Koloko was 12 of 13 from the field, including five dunks, but the rest of the Wildcats were 19 of 55, including 5 of 27 on 3-pointers.
Mathurin even got off to a slow start. He was 2 of 9 before making six of his last 10.
“Ben’s not afraid of the moment. He’s a special player who has an ability to rise up another level when needed. He has that clutch gene,” Arizona coach Tommy Lloyd said. “I honestly felt really good when he had the ball in hands there. I knew he was going to shoot a 3. Right when he snapped that 3 off to tie it, it was pretty impressive.”
Mathurin and Koloko did enough though for the Wildcats (33-3) to avoid becoming the second No. 1 seed to fall during the second round. They advanced to Thursday’s South Region semifinals in San Antonio, Texas, where they will face fifth-seeded Houston.
“I mean, it was simple, it was win or go home,” Koloko said. “That’s not the first time we were down. We knew we had to keep playing our game. Coach trusted us and told us, you’ve got to hang in there. That’s what we did. We didn’t panic. We played our game and we came back.”
Chuck O’Bannon Jr. had a career-high 23 points for TCU (21-13) while Mike Miles Jr. and Eddie Lampkin Jr. had 20 apiece. The Horned Frogs were looking to get to the Sweet 16 for the first time.
For all the latest Sports News Click Here
For the latest news and updates, follow us on Google News.
Denial of responsibility! NewsBit.us is an automatic aggregator around the global media. All the content are available free on Internet. We have just arranged it in one platform for educational purpose only. In each content, the hyperlink to the primary source is specified. All trademarks belong to their rightful owners, all materials to their authors. If you are the owner of the content and do not want us to publish your materials on our website, please contact us by email – [email protected]. The content will be deleted within 24 hours.
