SANOGO, UCONN PULL AWAY FROM GAELS
UConn decided to return to its roots five years ago, hiring a former Big East guard as coach and then a couple years later returning to the conference where it became a national power.
Now the Huskies are back in the Sweet 16, looking like the beasts of the Big East again.
Adama Sanogo scored 24 points and Jordan Hawkins delivered from the 3-point line in the second half as UConn pulled away from Saint Mary’s (27-8) for a 70-55 win on Sunday at Albany, N.Y., that put the Huskies in the Sweet 16 for the first time in nine years.
No. 4 seed UConn (27-8) advanced to the West Regional in Las Vegas on Thursday. Next up is eighth-seeded Arkansas, which knocked off No. 1 seed Kansas.
For the second straight game, the Huskies buried an opponent after playing a close first half. UConn outscored Iona and Saint Mary’s by a combined 86-49 in the second half in Albany this weekend.
“Eventually our depth, elite rebounding, top-20 defense, top-five offense, with
the depth, I think we’re able to break some teams,” said UConn coach Dan Hurley, a former Seton Hall guard from New Jersey who was hired in 2018.
The Huskies last played in the second weekend of the tournament in 2014, when they won the most recent — and most surprising — of four national titles in a 15year span. The first three of those titles came as a member of the Big East under coach Jim Calhoun, and all went through the West Region.
That last championship run came as a member of the American Athletic Conference, the league birthed from the Big East’s footballbasketball
breakup in 2013.
UConn went with the football schools and played seven years in the AAC, where its football program floundered while its vaunted men’s basketball team slipped into irrelevance.
With Hurley in charge, it has risen again, taking another step after being oneand-done in the NCAA Tournament the past two years at a place that never lost its lofty standards.
“I think in the first and even second round of tournaments, it’s more of a burden to play at UConn than it is an advantage,” Hurley said of the pressure.
No. 3 Gonzaga 84, No. 6 TCU 81: At Denver, Drew
Timme extended his one-ofa-kind college career by at least one more game, finishing with 28 points and eight rebounds Sunday to help Gonzaga make its eighth straight Sweet 16 with a come-from-behind win over TCU.
Timme made his first 3pointer since December — and only his third of the season — as part of a 13-1 run that helped the Zags (30-5) take a seven-point lead with just under nine minutes left after trailing most of the night.
After TCU pulled within three late, Timme made a twisting shot in the lane with a defender draped all over him to trigger a 4-0 mini-run that put the game out of reach.
Next stop for the 6-foot-10 senior and his social mediafriendly moustache — Las Vegas for the West Region semifinals and a meeting with UCLA on Thursday. It will be a rematch of their Final Four game two years ago, when Jalen Suggs banked one in from the half-court logo at the buzzer for the win.
Mike Miles Jr. finished with 24 points and four assists in his second straight electric game for the sixthseeded Horned Frogs (22-13), who were trying to win two games in the same tournament for the first time in program history.