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McNeese coach Will Wade and his boombox-toting manager are moving on in March Madness after the 12th-seeded Cowboys held off late-charging No. 5 seed Clemson 69-67 in Providence, Rhode Island, in the first bracket-buster of the NCAA Tournament.
Brandon Murray scored 14 of his 21 points in a stifling first half when the Southland Conference school from Lake Charles, Louisiana, held Clemson to 13 points. After falling behind by as many as 24, the Tigers rallied, erasing most of a 12-point deficit in the final minute before running out of time.
It was McNeese’s first NCAA Tournament win. The Cowboys (28-6) will play fourth-seeded Purdue on Saturday.
Chris Shumate added 13 points and 11 rebounds for McNeese, which has been best-known this March for its viral, rapping manager and a renegade coach who reportedly already lined up his next job — at North Carolina State.
The Wolfpack will have to wait at least another 48 hours, because Wade is still needed in Providence.
A 7½-point underdog, McNeese (28-6) held the Tigers to one basket over almost eight minutes during a 17-2 first-half run that turned a tie game into a 23-8 lead. After Clemson (27-7) scored the first three points of the second, the Cowboys ran off nine in a row and led by as many as 24 points.
Jaeden Zackery scored 24 points, Chase Hunter had 21 and Viktor Lakhin grabbed 10 rebounds for Clemson before fouling out with six minutes left in the game.
McNeese was ahead by 12 before Clemson trimmed the deficit. Hunter’s last basket came as time expired.
Purdue 75, High Point 63: Trey Kaufman-Renn had 21 points and eight rebounds for the Boilermakers, and Big Ten Player of the Year Braden Smith added 20 points and six assists as Purdue (23-11) avoided a first-round exit after reaching the championship game last season.
D’Maurian Williams had 12 points for No. 13 seed High Point (29-6), which had won 14 straight.
St. John’s 83, Omaha 53: Rick Pitino returned to Providence and picked up a March Madness victory for yet another school, coaching the second-seeded Red Storm to a second-round matchup with longtime nemesis John Calipari.
RJ Luis Jr. had 22 points and eight rebounds for St. John’s, which pulled away early in the second half to earn a matchup against No. 10 seed Arkansas on Saturday, with the winner earning a trip to the Sweet 16. But more delectable for basketball fans will be the pairing of Pitino and Calipari. The two strong-willed Hall of Famers developed an unfriendly rivalry in the 2010s when Calipari was at Kentucky and Pitino was an hour away at Louisville.
Arkansas 79, Kansas 72: Jonas Aidoo scored 22 points for 10th-seeded Arkansas in the latest meeting between two of college basketball’s winningest coaches. Johnell Davis added 18 points, including some crucial late free throws, to help Calipari to his first tournament victory as the Razorbacks’ coach.
Zeke Mayo had 18 points for Kansas (21-13), which has made 35 straight NCAA Tournaments and hadn’t lost in the first round since 2006 — Bill Self’s third season as the head coach.
Tennessee 77, Wofford 62: Chaz Lanier scored 29 points on 11-of-22 shooting for Tennessee, which never trailed as it made the round of 32 for the fourth straight season. Coach Rick Barnes’ Vols (28-7) will play No. 7 seed UCLA on Saturday in the Midwest Region as they try to reach a third straight Sweet 16.
Zakai Zeigler had 12 points and 12 assists for Tennessee. No. 15 seed Wofford was making its sixth NCAA Tournament appearance but ended a run of four straight trips to the second round. Jackson Sivills led the Terriers (19-16) with 15 points.
UCLA 72, Utah State 47: Skyy Clark and Eric Dailey Jr. each scored 14 points as UCLA reached the second round of the NCAA Tournament for the fourth time in five seasons. Aday Mara, a 7-foot-3 reserve center, added 10 points for coach Mick Cronin’s Bruins. UCLA will seek a fourth Sweet 16 appearance in the past five years.
Mason Falslev had 17 points and Deyton Albury scored 12 for Utah State, which reached its third consecutive NCAA Tournament, all under a different head coach.
Drake 67, Missouri 57: Bennett Stirtz scored 21 points and No. 11 seed Drake held on after blowing most of a 15-point lead in Wichita, Kansas. Tavion Banks added 15 points and five rebounds for the Bulldogs (31-3), who rely heavily on Division II transfers under first-year coach Ben McCollum. They advanced to a second-round matchup with third-seeded Texas Tech on Saturday.
Caleb Grill had 14 points and Tamar Bates had 10 before fouling out for Missouri (22-12). The Tigers finished the season losing five of their last six.
Texas Tech 82, UNC Wilmington 72: Elijah Hawkins led the third-seeded Red Raiders (26-8) with 14 points, 10 assists and nine rebounds as they repelled a strong challenge from the 14th-seeded CAA champion Seahawks (27-8).
Nolan Hodge came off the bench to give the Seahawks 18 points, seven rebounds and three assists. Sean Moore had nine points and nine rebounds, and Harlan Obioha had seven points and nine rebounds.
UNCW erased a 14-point deficit to briefly take leads in the second half. But Kerwin Walton’s 3-pointer with 12:42 left gave Texas Tech a 53-50 edge, and the Red Raiders remained ahead.
Wisconsin 85, Montana 66: Wisconsin grinded its way back into the March Madness win column, getting double-digit scoring from five players. This was the first victory in the NCAA Tournament for the third-seeded Badgers since 2022.
Next, coach Greg Gard’s team will try to make the Sweet 16 for the first time in eight years with a game against Brigham Young in the East Region.
John Blackwell led Wisconsin with 19 points and Steven Crowl scored 18. Te’Jon Sawyer and Kai Johnson led Montana (25-10) with 15 points each.
Creighton 89, Louisville 75: Jamiya Neal scored a career-high 29 points and had 12 rebounds, Steven Ashworth connected from well beyond the arc on the way to 22 points, and ninth-seeded Creighton (25-10) beat No. 8 seed Louisville (27-8) in Lexington, Kentucky. Coach Greg McDermott’s Bluejays won their fifth consecutive March Madness opener and beat a team ranked in the top 10 for the second time this season. Louisville, despite its unimpressive seeding, entered at No. 10 in the AP Top 25.
Seeking its fourth Sweet 16 appearance in five years, Creighton will play No. 1 overall seed Auburn in the second round of the South Region on Saturday.
Auburn 83, Alabama State 63: Miles Kelly made seven 3-pointers and scored 23 points, All-American Johni Broome added 14 points and 11 rebounds, and the Tigers (29-5) beat the Hornets (20-16) in Lexington, Kentucky. The schools are separated by about 50 miles in south Alabama.
Amarr Knox led Alabama State with 18 points.
The Tigers lasted one NCAA game in 2024, losing to Yale days after winning the Southeastern Conference Tournament. This time, Auburn came in having lost three of four inside the power-packed SEC.
Houston 78, Southern Illinois Edwardsville 40: Milos Uzan scored 16 points, LJ Cryer added 15 and No. 1 seed Houston was able to rest its starters early in Wichita, Kansas.
JaVier Francis added 13 points and eight boards for the Big 12 champs, who will carry a 14-game winning streak into a second-round matchup with No. 8 seed Gonzaga in the Midwest Region. Houston has won 26 of its last 27 games.
Ray’Sean Taylor scored 10 points to lead SIUE, the champion of the Ohio Valley, who went just 2 of 24 from beyond the 3-point arc in its first NCAA appearance.
Gonzaga 89, Georgia 68: Khalif Battle scored 24 points, Nolan Hickman had 18 and Gonzaga (26-8) routed Georgia. The Zags used a sharp, focused performance to move into the second round for the 22nd time since Mark Few took over as coach in 1999. They went 12 for 20 from 3-point range and shot 55% from the field overall.
Texas A&M 80, Yale 71: A&M snuffed out hope of another Ivy League upset, sending Yale back to class behind 25 points and 10 rebounds from big man Pharrel Payne. The fourth-seeded Aggies had been placed on a lot of “upset watch” lists, thanks mainly to going against a Yale team some thought might be better than the one that pulled off a first-round shocker last year against Auburn. A&M’s next game is Saturday against Michigan.
Former Virginia Tech coach Buzz Williams earned his second March Madness win in six years with the Aggies. A&M’s next game is Saturday against Michigan, which beat UC San Diego 68-65.
John Poulakidas led 13th-seeded Yale (22-8) with 23 points. Bez Mbeng, whose younger brother Isaiah plays for William & Mary, had eight rebounds and nine assists.
Michigan 68, UC San Diego 65: Vladislav Goldin and Michigan proved a bit too much for UC San Diego when the Russian center scored 14 points and the fifth-seeded Wolverines overcame Tyler McGhie’s 25 points to escape.
McGhie’s 3-point attempt at the buzzer, with 7-footer Danny Wolf in his face, hit the back iron.
Women
NCAA FIRST FOUR
Columbia 63, Washington 60: Riley Weiss scored 14 of her 24 points in the fourth quarter to help Columbia rally from a 13-point halftime deficit in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, to earn the school’s first-ever NCAA Tournament victory.
Cecelia Collins added 12 points for the Lions (24-6), who won a matchup of 11-seeds. They’ll face sixth-seeded West Virginia on Saturday in Chapel Hill.
Columbia (24-6) trailed most of the game until the fourth quarter, when Weiss got hot. Her two free throws with 18 seconds left gave the Lions a 61-57 lead. Elle Ladine hit a 3-pointer a few seconds later to make it a one-point game. Weiss then swished two free throws to make it 63-60 with 12 seconds left. Washington (19-14) had one last chance, but this time Ladine’s 3-pointer was off.
WNIT FIRST ROUND
Duquesne 70, Longwood 68: Jerni Kiaku hit an off-balance leaner from the top of the key with three-tenths of a second on the clock to lift the Dukes (20-12) over the Lancers (22-12) in the Women’s National Invitational Tournament in Pittsburgh. Duquesne rallied from a 54-42 deficit with 38 seconds left in the third quarter.
Frances Ulysse hit two tying free throws for Longwood with 24.8 seconds remaining. The Lancers nevertheless tied their Division I season record for victories.
Senior Malea Brown led Longwood with 20 points, including going 4 for 6 from 3-point range, with eight rebounds. Amor Harris scored 12 points and Ulysse added 10.
The Dukes will play at Miami of Ohio at 1 p.m. Sunday.
WBIT FIRST ROUND
Virginia Tech 61, North Carolina A&T 45: The Hokies, one of the four top seeds in the Women’s Basketball Invitation Tournament, ousted the Coastal Athletic Association regular-season champion Aggies behind Lani White’s 18 points and seven rebounds, plus a strong defense in Blacksburg.
Chaniya Clark led the Aggies with 19 points and 13 rebounds. They went ahead 9-0 and 11-2, but Tech led 17-13 by the first quarter’s end.
The Hokies outscored A&T 21-5 in the second quarter to move ahead 38-18. They next will play at 4 p.m. Sunday at Cassell Coliseum against Texas Tech, which won 65-48 Thursday night at Wyoming.
James Madison 77, Davidson 50: Four Dukes scored in double figures, and JMU dominated the fourth quarter at the Atlantic Union Bank Center in Harrisonburg in the opening round of the Women’s Basketball Invitation Tournament.
JMU (29-5), which tied its single-season program record for wins, advanced to Sunday’s WBIT round of 16, where it hosts Marquette in a 4 p.m. tipoff. Marquette (21-10) posted a 74-69 win at Drake on Thursday.
Kseniia Kozlova recorded her eighth double-double of the season with a game-high 19 points and 10 rebounds. Ro Scott scored 16 points off the bench, hitting two of JMU’s five second-half 3-pointers. Peyton McDaniel netted 14 points, while Bree Robinson tied her career high with 12 points.
