Hot-shooting Wildcats run over North Dakota St.
TUCSON — There’s a reason college basketball teams rarely play back-toback road games in different time zones, but North Dakota State tried to do just that on Tuesday at McKale Center after going down to the wire Monday at UNLV. Arizona took full advantage.
In a 97-45 win over the Bison, which were cramming in the two games as addons to this weekend’s Las Vegas Main Event, the Wildcats pounced early to take an 11-0 run. They led by up to 24 in the first half before NDSU’s Willie Guy hit a three-quarter-court shot at the halftime buzzer. Then they stomped all over the Bison after halftime.
Five players scored in double figures for Arizona, led again by center Christian Koloko, who had 16 points, five rebounds and two blocks. Bennedict Mathurin and Azuolas Tubelis each had 15 points, with Mathurin hitting 3 of 5 3-pointers, while Kerr Kriisa hit 4 of 8 3s to score 12 points. Center Oumar Ballo added 10 points and seven rebounds off the bench.
Combined with UA’s 104-50 win over UTRGV on Friday, it was the first time the Wildcats had beaten multiple opponents by 50 points in the same season since 1996-97, when they beat Robert Morris by 64 and Oregon State by 51. UA had not beaten opponents by 50 or more in back to back games since 1920-21.
Overall, Arizona shot 51.5% from the field and outrebounded NDSU 49-36. The Bison shot just 26.2% for the game and committed 17 turnovers that led to 21 UA points.
As impressive a highlight as Guy’s buzzer heave was at the end of the first half, it provided no momentum whatsoever for the Bison. Up 44-23 at halftime, UA used a barrage of 3-pointers to build a 44-point lead, 77-33, with over 11 minutes still to go.
During one five-minute stretch early in the second half, Arizona hit five 3pointers, two from Mathurin, one from Kriisa one from Kim Aiken and another from Justin Kier. Those helped put the Wildcats up 66-29 while Aiken hit another later with 12:149 left to give UA a 73-31 lead.
The Wildcats went ahead 73-31 with 12:49 still to go when Aiken hit another 3, while UA coach Tommy Lloyd began going deeper into his bench.
But the Wildcats still held a 95-42 lead during the final media timeout with 3:23 to go.
Having lost just 64-62 at UNLV on Monday — and traveling to Tucson for Tuesday’s game — the Bison appeared flat early in the game.
Guy's shot capped what was otherwise a rough half of shooting for the Bison inside, who shot just 27.3% overall and particularly struggled inside the arc — making just 5 of 22 two-point shots.
Arizona built a quick 11-0 lead while North Dakota State missed its first five shots and had three turnovers in the first three minutes of the game.
Not surprisingly, Koloko had a block in that span, too, after blocking 10 shots over UA's first two games last week.