Houston ends Beavers’ run; Baylor also in Final 4
Kelvin Sampson stood atop a ladder and yanked loose the remnants of the net from the rim. He turned toward the redclad Houston fans and started pumping his right fist, the net clutched in that hand the entire time.
Years of building a onceproud program back to prominence, of putting together a formula that was about way more than flashy offense — it all led to this breakthrough moment for Sampson and the Cougars.
Yes, Houston is going back to the Final Four for the first time since the famed “Phi Slama Jama” era after Monday night’s 6761 win over Oregon State in Indianapolis.
“I always thought we could,” Sampson said, “but we had to climb the ladder.”
It was not supposed to be easy to get the secondseeded Cougars (283) back into the Final Four for the first time in 37 years, Sampson said. And his team proved him right, squandering a 17point lead before preventing the 12thseeded Beavers from adding one more surprising result to a Midwest Region bracket filled with upsets.
Quentin Grimes hit a 3pointer with 3:21 left to break a 5555 tie, a shot from near the top of the arc that finally steadied the Cougars. And Houston knocked down enough freethrow tries late while holding Oregon State without a basket during a critical 31⁄2 minutes.
That sent the Cougars to the national semifinals to face Baylor.
Maurice Calloo scored 13 points to lead Oregon State (2013), which was vying to become the worstseeded team ever to make a Final Four — and to extend a remarkable postseason run for a team that was picked to finish last in the Pac12. The Beavers dug a 3417 hole at halftime, then climbed all the way back only to see Grimes put the Cougars back in front.
“It was right there within our grasp with the effort we showed in the second half,” Oregon State head coach Wayne Tinkle said. “Really proud of this group. We got every single ounce out of them.”
Marcus Sasser scored 20 points to lead Houston and Grimes added 18.
DeJon Jarreau, the American Athletic Conference’s Defensive Player of the Year, was named the Most Outstanding player of the Midwest Region. Jarreau finished with 10 points, eight rebounds and eight assists two days after flirting with another tripledouble and shutting down Syracuse’s Buddy Boeheim in the Sweet 16.
Baylor 81, Arkansas 72: The Bears reached the Final Four for the first time in 71 years, getting 22 points from MaCio Teague and a dominating defensive performance from Davion Mitchell to beat the Razorbacks in Indianapolis.
The topseeded Bears (262) repeatedly beat the Razorbacks off the dribble to lead by 12 barely four minutes in, then on backdoor cuts to stretch it to 18.
JD Notae and Davonte Davis had 14 apiece for the Razorbacks (257), who came up one game short of their first Final Four in 26 years.
Wulbrun to Denver: The University of Denver hired Jeff Wulbrun as its head coach. Wulbrun spent the past five seasons as an assistant coach to Jerod Haase at Stanford. Wulburn had a sevenseason stint (198693) as an assistant to Lou Campanelli at Cal. This will be Wilbrun’s first collegiate headcoaching job.