Miami outclasses Virginia Tech
Balanced Louseville beats Depaul 79-58
CORAL GABLES, Fla, Feb 28, (AP): An hour before tip-off, several Miami Hurricanes stretching on the court craned their necks toward the scoreboard to watch a few of this season’s video highlights. Then they made some more.
Shane Larkin scored 22 points and played smothering defense on Erick Green to help the Hurricanes bounce back from a loss and beat Virginia Tech 76-58 Wednesday night.
Despite a slow start, Miami (23-4, 141 Atlantic Coast Conference) never trailed and improved to 13-0 at home. The Hurricanes hold a 2 1/2-game edge over second-place Duke in the ACC and can clinch their first conference basketball championship by beating the Blue Devils on Saturday.
“It’s just another game on the schedule,” Larkin said before he and his teammates dissolved in laughter that acknowledged the comment as nonsense.
“It’s going to be a blast,’’ guard Trey McKinney Jones said. “We beat them here this year, and we beat them there last year, so they’re going to be gunning for our heads.’’
Miami shook a 10-day scoring slump just in time for Duke. The Hurricanes were coming off a loss at Wake Forest that ended their 14-game winning streak and their bid to go unbeaten in the ACC, and they went 11 minutes without a basket early against Virginia Tech before pulling away.
Louisville 79, DePaul 58 In Rosemont, Ill, Rick Pitino thinks Russ Smith is the key to the season for No. 10 Louisville, and the shifty guard believes he can help the Cardinals make another long run in March.
He sure looked ready on Wednesday night.
Smith scored 17 points, Peyton Siva had 16 and Louisville pulled away for a 79-58 victory over DePaul that ran its winning streak to four ahead of a big matchup with No. 12 Syracuse this weekend.
Georgetown 79, Connecticut 78 In Storrs, Conn, Georgetown was looking for the win that would extend its winning streak and lead in the Big East Conference.
Connecticut was looking for THE win, a chance to celebrate in a season winding down with no postseason opportunities.
Both teams gave incredible efforts in a double-overtime game finally won 79-78 by the seventh-ranked Hoyas on Wednesday night.
It wasn’t only the players who left Gampel Pavilion exhausted and spent emotionally. The sellout crowd of 10,167 seemed ready to storm the court a couple of times only to see the Hoyas find a way to win. New Mexico 70, San Diego St 60 In Albuquerque, NM, when New Mexico post players Alex Kirk and Cameron Bairstow last saw San Diego State in the first meeting between the teams last month, they combined for two points and nine rebounds.
It was quite a different story Wednesday night for the Lobos’ frontcourt duo.
Kirk scored a season-high 25 points and Bairstow added 16 to help No. 14 New Mexico beat the Aztecs 70-60.
“They’re like anybody - when they don’t play well against somebody, you want to make up for that,’’ Lobos coach Steve Alford said. ‘’They did not have very good games in San Diego and I think they really responded in this game.’’
Texas 92, Oklahoma 86 In Austin, Texas, when Oklahoma’s Amath M’Baye leaped to dunk and flashed an upside-down ‘’Hook’em Horns’’ hand sign, the Sooners were in complete control of archrival Texas with a 22-point lead in the second half.
And then Texas’ Myck Kabongo took over and the Longhorns salvaged a sliver of fun in an otherwise miserable season by rallying to a wild 92-86 overtime victory Wednesday night.
Kabongo scored 31 points, fueling a rally over the final 8 minutes of regulation and sending the game to overtime with a desperation jumper over a defender at the buzzer to tie it at 77.
Then Kabongo scored Texas’ first six points in overtime as the Longhorns (1315, 5-10 Big 12) stunned Oklahoma (189, 9-6) with their largest comeback in 15 years under coach Rick Barnes.
Kentucky 85, Mississippi St 55 In Lexington, Ky, Ryan Harrow’s 19 points led Kentucky as every starter reached double figures, and the Wildcats dominated outmanned Mississippi State for an 85-55 victory Wednesday night, the Wildcats’ third in a row.