Aggies dip into survival kit again
Texas A&M’s first two games in the NCAA Tournament have hardly been a stroll on the River Walk for the Aggies. Instead they’ve spent 85 game minutes performing the basketball equivalent of dangling from Enchanted Rock in the nearby Hill Country.
The second-seeded Aggies quickly cobbled together another postseason escape act, this time overcoming a double-digit deficit to defeat seventh-seeded Iowa State 84-82 in overtime on Wednesday night at the Alamodome in San Antonio.
“Adversity is nothing new to us, this entire year,” A&M guard Jordan Nixon said. “It’s just who we are — we never say die. … If you’re familiar with Texas A&M basketball this year, it has not been an easy ride.”
The payoffs have been fantastic, however, for the Aggies (25-2). Nixon’s driving layup with six seconds remaining in regulation tied it at 75, and then she smoothly sank the gamewinner at the buzzer in overtime on a drive into the lane with a basket off the glass after dribbling the length of the court.
“I can’t say enough about this basketball team. Our kids were just fighting and clawing,” A&M coach Gary Blair said. “… People have doubted us all year. We’re not sure how good we are, but we know we’re good every night at giving energy and giving you entertainment. I hope everybody in Bryan-College Station celebrated the moment.”
Nixon, a transfer from Notre Dame, scored a gamehigh 35 points. A&M will face third-seeded Arizona (18-5), which defeated 11thseeded BYU at the same time the Aggies and Cyclones were playing, in the Sweet 16 in the Alamodome at 7 p.m. Saturday.
The Aggies have made the Sweet 16 for a third consecutive NCAA Tournament. Iowa State (17-11) and longtime coach Bill Fennelly were trying to make the coveted round for the first time since 2010 but fell two points shy.
“We showed our worthiness in this tournament,” Fennelly said. “It hurts a lot, and I’m dying inside. And I’m dying that I don’t get to coach them tomorrow, because this team is special. It’s killing me that I don’t get to — but I got to (coach them). And I’ll remember that forever.”
Both teams were coming off edge-of-your-seat, fourpoint victories in the opening round — A&M 84-80 over 15th-seed Troy and ISU 79-75 over 10th-seed Michigan State.
An emotional Nixon dedicated Wednesday’s comeback victory to former A&M guard David Edwards, who was one of her coaches back home in New York. Edwards, a star player for the Aggies in the early 1990s, died of COVID-19 complications a year ago in New York.
“Today was for him, (but) I didn’t tell anybody (beforehand),” Nixon said. “I just wanted to win the game — it didn’t matter how it happened. There was a little something in me that wanted to do something for him, to dedicate to his memory.
“That’s where the emotion came from. I can hear him in my head. … He’s one of my biggest fans, and this game is for him.”
The Aggies trailed by a dozen late in the third quarter before outscoring the Cyclones 27-18 in the fourth to force overtime. Iowa State made 16 of 30 3-pointers but also committed 24 turnovers to only seven for the Aggies.
“We know who we are and we know what we can do,” Nixon said of the Aggies, who won their first SEC regular-season title this season before losing in the semifinals of the SEC tournament to Georgia.
“We just stuck with our game plan (against ISU), and we dug deep. We made plays when we needed to. … Teams can fall apart, and we didn’t do that at any point.”
Following her game-winner off the glass that took its sweet time dropping through the basket, Nixon paused and for a moment stared toward the Alamodome ceiling.
“As soon as I put the shot up, I knew it was going in,” she said. “We didn’t want to go home, and I’m glad we’re still dancing. I savored the moment. … I was taking it in that we were going to the Sweet 16. We had just clawed back against a really good team, and these are the moments you remember with your teammates.
“I knew they were going to swarm me (afterward), so I was just waiting for it to happen.”