Nevada in a Comeback for the Ages Takes down Cincinnati

Nashville: The Wolfpack overcame a 22-point deficit to shock the Bearcats 75-73 to advance to the schools second-ever Sweet 16. The Wolfpack advance to face Loyola Chicago on Thursday night in Atlanta with a potential shot at the mighty Kentucky Wildcats. This comeback for Nevada was tied for the second largest NCAA Tournament comeback in the 80-year history of the NCAA Tournament.

Josh Hall was the hero for the Wolfpack after hitting the go-ahead game-winning bucket with 9 seconds left to play in the game. Josh Hall was a huge key for the Wolfpack as he had 14 points and 6 rebounds.

Cody Martin was the difference maker in this game leading the Wolfpack with 25 points, 10-20 FG, 4-4 FT, and 6 rebounds.

Coach Eric Musselman after the game:

“Can’t say enough about our

energy and effort. I mean, it looked — we were

struggling so much, and they were just dominating the

backboards. We knew they were a great rebounding

team.

The thing that’s amazing, when you look back on this

game, is just the fact that we just played 40 minutes

and had two turnovers against arguably one of the

most aggressive, best defensive teams in the country.

But eventually, kind of like the Texas game, eventually

our pace of play won out. And we got that thing above

40 points in the second half, and I thought that was

really important.

The first half, we didn’t run anything. Then, obviously,

we changed our whole defensive concept at halftime

and went to a trapping defense that, quite frankly, we

haven’t been very good at this year in that trapping

defense.

We were great in it in years one and two. But this year,

we struggle with it for whatever reason. We had Josh

as our trapper and kind of left their point guard were just going to live with it.

That locker room right now, I’ve never seen anything

like it in my life. It’s the happiest I’ve ever seen. It’s the

happiest I’ve ever been in my life. I couldn’t be more

proud of a team. Every single player in there, I mean,

this feeling’s never going away the rest of any of our lives”

Cincinnati dropped to 31-5 after Sunday nights season-ending loss to Nevada. The Bearcats were not able to finish the game with 11 min left they let a sneaky Nevada team hang around and that cost the Bearcats the season.

Mick Cronin after the loss:

“Well, we had watched, obviously

scouted Nevada, and we knew they were an older

team, dangerous team on offense, and I knew the

game was far from over. We tried to continue to say

that.

Our guys did a great job until the last ten minutes,

where obviously they took the gamble and just started

trapping Jacob.

We were playing 4-on-3 and got the deer in the

headlights look. Ball stopped dropping for us. We got

fouled a lot of times and it wasn’t called around the rim.

And that got in our heads. It affected our defensive

execution.

But give credit to Nevada for the win. The game’s

never over, obviously, in the NCAA tournament

especially if you turn the TV on until the clock hits zero.

Obviously, feel terrible for our guys. But it’s been an

honor to coach Jacob and Kyle in particular that are

sitting here with me and, obviously, Gary Clark and all

the guys. We’ve had an unbelievable season, and I

appreciate their attitude and their effort.

We play really hard. We demand a lot of our players,

and they’re accountable. They work hard. They’re

good kids. And they allow us to try to bring out the

best in them. I appreciate the guys. Been an

unbelievable season, obviously. Wanted to win the

tournament and came up short today. Unfortunate.

The South Region is wide open now and Nevada has as good of a chance as anybody left. Clearly heading into Atlanta the favorite to advance to the Final Four will be Kentucky, however, Nevada might have something to say about that.

Mitch Davis

Radio host/ College Sports Beat Writer