Almost picture perfect

Milwaukee's last play went as planned -- but the shot missed

Thursday, March 20, 2003 Tournament Central | Live Scoreboard

SI.com On Site

• Brackets: Main | Experts' picks

• Mandel: Mid-majors rise with 'Zags

• Tourney Pickoff: Friday

• Closer Look: Gonzaga-Cincinnati

• Closer Look: California-N.C. State

• Closer Look: Connecticut-BYU

• Closer Look: Notre Dame-UW-Milw.

Thursday's Games

Midwest

No. 3 Marquette 72, No. 14 Holy Cross 68 No. 6 Missouri 72, No. 11 S. Illinois 71 No. 5 Wisconsin 81, No. 12 Weber St. 74 No. 13 Tulsa 84, No. 4 Dayton 71

West

No. 9 Gonzaga 74, No. 8 Cincy 69 | Closer Look No. 1 Arizona 80, No. 16 Vermont 51 No. 10 Arizona St. 84, No. 7 Memphis 71 No. 4 Illinois 65, No. 13 Western Kentucky 60 No. 11 C. Michigan 79, No. 6 Creighton 73 No. 5 N.Dame 70, No. 12 UW-Milw. 69 | Closer Look No. 2 Kansas 64, No. 15 Utah St. 61 No. 3 Duke 67, No. 14 Colorado St. 57

East

No. 8 Cal 76, No. 9 N.C. St. 74, OT | Closer Look No. 1 Oklahoma 71, No. 16 S.C. St. 54

South

No. 5 UConn 58, No. 12 BYU 53 | Closer Look No. 4 Stanford 77, No. 13 San Diego 69

Friday's Games

Midwest

No. 1 Kentucky vs. No. 16 IUPUI, 12:30 pm No. 8 Oregon vs. No. 9 Utah, 3 pm No. 2 Pittsburgh vs. No. 15 Wagner, 7:10 pm No. 7 Indiana vs. No. 10 Alabama, 9:40 pm

East

No. 3 Syracuse vs. No. 14 Manhattan, 12:15 pm No. 7 St. Joseph's vs. No. 10 Auburn, 12:25 pm No. 6 Oklahoma St. vs. No. 11 Penn 2:45 pm No. 2 Wake Forest vs. No. 15 ETSU, 2:55 pm No. 4 Louisville vs. No. 13 Austin Peay, 7:20 pm No. 5 Mississippi St. vs. No. 12 Butler, 9:50 pm

South

No. 1 Texas vs. UNC-Asheville, 12:30 pm No. 8 LSU vs. No. 9 Purdue, 3 pm No. 7 Mich. St. vs. No. 10 Colorado, 7:10 pm No. 3 Xavier vs. No. 14 Troy State, 7:25 pm No. 2 Florida vs. No. 15 Sam Houston, 9:40 pm No. 6 Maryland vs. No. 11 UNC-Wilm., 9:55 pm

Complete Daily Schedule

By Seth Davis, Sports Illustrated

INDIANAPOLIS -- The situation unfolded so slowly, it felt surreal. Clay Tucker, Wisconsin-Milwaukee's 6-foot-3 senior captain, brought the ball upcourt with his team trailing Notre Dame by one point. Tucker dribbled uncontested near midcourt for nearly 20 long seconds. His defender, Torrian Jones, stood crouched in a defensive posture a few feet away, waiting for Tucker to make his move. "I was thinking, This is it, we're going to win," Tucker said later.

At that moment, Panthers coach Bruce Pearl recalled a similar situation last season at rival Wisconsin, when he called timeout and drew up a play, only to see his team turn it over in an effort to get Tucker the ball. Seeing the ball -- and the outcome -- in the right pair of hands, Pearl simply walked toward the baseline and, like everyone else, waited for Tucker to make his move. "I thought," Pearl said later, "that we had the game won."

Finally, with just eight seconds remaining, Tucker drove the lane, drew two defenders and made a perfect wraparound bounce pass to junior forward Dylan Page. Page was in an awkward position to attempt a bank shot, but he has always been taught to use the backboard on layups, so that's what he did. Alas, he overshot the goal. Notre Dame's Jordan Cornette snared the rebound and tossed it to his point guard, Chris Thomas, who dribbled away from the lane as time expired. The fourth-seeded Irish escaped with a 70-69 win.

Before Pearl even had a chance to speak to his team in the locker room, Tucker addressed his teammates, taking responsibility for missing a layup late in the game as well as two free throws. He didn't want Page to blame himself, and while Pearl echoed those sentiments -- "Dylan can't focus on that last shot, because I'd get him that ball every time if I could," the coach said -- Page, predictably, was crestfallen. "I feel like I let my teammates down," he said. "They're not going to say anything bad about me, but inside I know if I made that shot we would have won the game. Maybe it wasn't my fault that we lost, but it's my fault we didn't win."

 

Related information

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Irish win one-point thriller over UW-Milwaukee

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Notre Dame-Wisconsin-Milwaukee Box Score

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