Aztecs muscle way into first Final Four
LOUISVILLE, Ky. — One year after Creighton ended San Diego State’s season in overtime in the 2022 NCAA Tournament, the two teams were locked in another nail-biter Sunday as each fought for a trip to its first Final Four.
Déjà vu threatened to grab them by the throat and force overtime before a big call involving the tiniest player on the court shifted the tide in the Aztecs’ favor.
With the score tied and the game clock ticking into the final seconds, Darrion Trammell drove into the lane and shot a floater short — but officials called a foul on Creighton point guard Ryan Nembhard. They put 1.2 seconds back on the clock. and after a timeout, Trammell went to the free-throw line for the first time in the game to shoot for the lead.
Trammell scored 21 points in San Diego State’s Sweet 16 upset of No. 1 Alabama but had missed nine of his 14 shots against Creighton. Alone at the foul line and surrounded by five blue jerseys as his four teammates stood arm in arm on the March Madness logo, he missed the first free throw and nearly sucked the air out of the arena.
Trammell’s mother, Diema Adams-Parham, might have held it all in her lungs. From her seat behind the San Diego State bench, she held her breath for what she believed would happen next.
“I thought, ‘OK, he might miss one, but he’s not going to miss two,’ ” she said.
Trammell nailed the second free throw. Creighton prepared for one last play hoping to at least force overtime. Baylor Scheierman’s Hail Mary full-court pass ricocheted off two sets of fingertips and landed out of bounds after time expired. Officials reviewed the play to be certain no time was left, delaying San Diego State’s celebration and Creighton’s misery for a tension-filled half minute before the Aztecs’ 57-56 victory was confirmed.
“I think I talked for 10 minutes. I don’t know if anybody heard 30 seconds,” San Diego State coach Brian Dutcher said, laughing before he ran through his thought process in the huddle: “Well, if it’s their ball and more than 0.4, then we have to play straight; and if it’s 0.3, we’re going to surround the rim and not let them lob; if it’s our ball, we’re about to throw deep where we can get it in and touch it; hold on, hold on, who is in the game? You know, it was controlled madness.”
Controlled madness is a good way to describe the way the Aztecs, known for their suffocating defense and physical style of play, flipped the script after they trailed by as many as eight points in the first half.
San Diego State missed 10 of its first 21 shots with no offensive rebounds and didn’t shoot its first free
throw or get its first second-chance bucket until there were three minutes to go in the half. Creighton was able to switch into an offensive gear San Diego State just didn’t have.
But in the second half, the Aztecs turned the game into the type of rock fight that suited them perfectly. They turned up the fullcourt pressure on the Bluejays’ guards and began meeting 7-foot center Ryan Kalkbrenner at the rim. Even when Creighton began
pressing and scoring inside and both teams traded baskets for an anxious final few minutes, San Diego State remained poised.
“We’ve been working on things like that all year,” said Trammell, who was named South Regional MVP. “There’s no coverage we haven’t seen. It was just about understanding that no moment is too big for us.”
Trammell said he did think Nembhard fouled him before his final shot. Nembhard, approached in the Creighton locker room after the game, declined to elaborate beyond, “I don’t know. It’s not really my job (to decide).”
Following the Aztecs’ Sweet 16 win, someone erased the scouting details from the whiteboard in the San Diego State locker room and wrote instead, “We are real tough ass dudes!”
Sunday, they were again. Lamont Butler, the Aztecs’ only reliable scorer in the first half, led the team with 18 points on 8-of-11 shooting. Trammell added 12 points. Center Nathan Mensah adjusted and blocked Kalkbrenner’s shot three times in the second half.
Trammell’s mother watched her son climb a ladder to cut down a piece of the net, a memento he’ll no doubt carry with him longer than the comments from naysayers who didn’t think he would play Division I basketball, let alone make it to a Final Four.
“It doesn’t matter what size you are if you’ve got heart to play,” she said. “This just proves that everybody deserves a chance, because look what happens.”