Chicago
Richardson scored 21 of his 23 points in the second half, and Syracuse extended its improbable run with a 68-62 victory over top-seeded Virginia on Sunday.
The Orange were among the last teams to get into the NCAA Tournament after a rough closing stretch, but slipped in as a 10 seed before storming to its first Final Four since 2013 and No. 6 overall. It comes at the end of a challenging season for coach Jim Boeheim, who was suspended for nine games as the result of an NCAA investigation.
“It was a whole team effort and these guys really deserve it,” Boeheim said. “We beat a great basketball team. I’ve never been prouder in all my 40 years as coach of a basketball team as I am of this team tonight.”
Syracuse (23-13), which trailed by 16 at the start of the second half, becomes the first 10 seed to make it to the Final Four and just the fourth double-digit seed to accomplish the feat. It’s the lowest seeded team to reach the national semifinals since VCU in 2011, according to STATS.
Michael Gbinije and freshman Tyler Lydon each scored 11 points for the Orange, who will face the winner of the East Regional final between North Carolina and Notre Dame on Saturday in Houston. Tyler Roberson finished with 10 points and eight rebounds.
“We worked so hard,” Gbinije said. “We’ve been through a lot.”
London Perrantes scored 15 of his 18 points in the first half for Virginia (29-8), which blew a 16-point lead in the second half. Malcolm Brogdon, the ACC player of the year, had 12 points on 2-of-14 shooting in the final game of his Cavaliers career.
Syracuse trailed 54-39 before it ripped off 25 of the next 29 points, including 15 in a row. And Richardson led the way, often taking the ball right at Brogdon.
Richardson’s driving layup made it 59-58 Orange with 5:47 remaining for their first lead since early in the first half. After Perrantes missed a long 3, Richardson connected from deep and smiled as he ran up the court while making circles around his eyes with his hands.
“I started slow, I had a couple of bad turnovers and Coach got on me at halftime,” Richardson said. “I knew I had to pick it up for my teammates. We were down, and I just wanted to come back and we did it.”
The confident freshman, who scored 21 points in Syracuse’s first-round win against Dayton, added another layup for his seventh straight point before Anthony Gill stopped Virginia’s drought with a basket inside.
The Cavaliers had a chance to tie in the final seconds after Gbinije went 1 for 2 at the line. But Devon Hall missed a 3-point attempt and Lydon and DaJuan Coleman combined for three free throws to close it out for the Orange.
Syracuse also trailed in the regional semifinal against Gonzaga, erasing a nine-point deficit in the final 6 1/2 minutes.
Virginia, which beat Syracuse 73-65 on Jan. 24, shot 35.7 percent in the second half. Gill and Mike Tobey finished with 10 points apiece.
Richardson went 6 for 16 from the field and 8 for 9 at the line. The 6-foot-6 forward, who was voted the most outstanding player of the region, also had seven rebounds.
“This is a dream come true for me,” he said.
Bouncing back from a jittery start, Virginia grabbed control with a 19-2 run in the first half. Perrantes sparked the turnaround with two straight 3-pointers and Darius Thompson finished it off with a circus layup on the break, making it 21-10 with 6:33 left and drawing an “ooohhh” from the crowd of 20,155.
Despite a memorable play from Lydon — the freshman lost his left shoe and threw it off to the side before draining a 3 — the Orange shot 30.8 percent from the field in the first half and trailed 35-21 at the break.
Nobody in the NBA was knocking down Ryan Arcidiacono’s door when his junior season ended a year ago. Buddy Hield — that was a different story.
Arcidiacono stayed at Villanova because he had no other choice. Hield stayed at Oklahoma because he had unfinished business.
The guards, who lead their respective teams in very different ways, are each closing out their senior years at the top of their sport — with a trip to the Final Four.
“It’s four years of commitment to Villanova and to a program,” Arcidiacono said, when asked to describe his emotions as he sprinted in circles after the Wildcats defeated Kansas.
The Oklahoma-Villanova semifinal Saturday will pit a pair of No. 2 seeds who knocked off the top seeds in their regions to earn their trips to Houston.
Oklahoma is back for the first time since 2002. The Sooners wouldn’t be there without Hield, who has debunked any notion that an NBA prospect has nothing to gain by staying at school.
He would’ve been a first-round pick had he left after last season, but has used Year 4 with the Sooners to get better at pretty much every facet of offense — ball-handling, footwork, creating shots and making them from longer range. He’s averaged 25.4 points a game this season. In four tournament games, including his 37-point effort in the win over Oregon, he has averaged 29.
That will pay off when the draft rolls around in June. Hield said the feeling he had last March, when the Sooners fell to Michigan State in the Sweet 16, is what brought him back.
“We had a bad taste in our mouth last spring, and we wanted to work hard,” Hield said. “As soon as we came back the next week, next day we were in the gym working out. Guys really wanted to get to this point.”
When it comes to shortcomings in March, though, nobody felt the pain more deeply than Arcidiacono and the Wildcats.
Villanova was a top seed last year and a No. 2 the year before — and didn’t make it out of the first weekend either time.
All worth it, said Arcidiacono, who averages 12 points and four assists and was a co-Big East Player of the Year last season.
A scrappy 6-foot-3 star at Neshaminy High School in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, Arcidiacono grew up loving the Wildcats. He remembers watching Scottie Reynolds take the pass just behind midcourt and drive to the hoop for the buzzer-beating basket that sent Jay Wright’s team to its last Final Four, in 2009. Arcidiacono had no visions of playing for Villanova, though.
“At that point in my life, I was just hoping to play basketball for fun and maybe get a scholarship,” he said.
He got the scholarship. At Villanova, no less. Wright was from the same area and the two bonded. Now, a matchup looms — in Houston, on college basketball’s biggest stage, against Hield, who is arguably its most valuable player.
“We went through the struggles,” Arcidiacono said. “We lost to Columbia our freshman year by 20 at home. We know what the lows are. Now we’re getting to see the highs.”