March Madness Live: N.C.A.A. Tournament Updates
March 20, 2021, 2:05 p.m. ET
Brothers Jacob and Tanner Grove are leading the way for Eastern Washington, totaling 30 points in the first half against Kansas with about two minutes to play.
March 20, 2021, 1:50 p.m. ET
North Carolina-Greensboro, a No. 13 seed, struggled early against fourth-seeded Florida State. But an eventual 9-0 run by the Spartans helped close the gap, and F.S.U. will open the second half with a lead of just 3 points.
March 20, 2021, 1:27 p.m. ET
Hopefully you read this lovely essay by one of our colleagues, Ken Plutnicki, on a 37-year-old men’s college basketball record that is at stake during this tournament.
The 1983-84 Harvard team shot 82.2 percent on free throws. Actually, we’ll need to be more precise than that — Harvard shot 82.18 percent (535 for 651) in an era where there were no 3-pointers and no shot clock.
Plutnicki was on that team, and this N.C.A.A. tournament he and his former teammates have been following two teams: No. 15 seed Oral Roberts and No. 5 seed Colorado.
Oral Roberts came into the tournament on pace to break the record. It knocked off No. 2 seed Ohio State on Friday in the biggest upset of the day, but in the process, slightly lowered its free throw shooting percentage by only going 14 for 18. Right now, before the Golden Eagles play seventh-seeded Florida on Sunday night, they are at 82.17 percent (378 for 460) — one hundredth of a percentage point behind Harvard.
Colorado, meanwhile, entered the tournament at 82.16 percent (419 for 510). And in the first half against Georgetown, while the Buffaloes were racing to a 47-23 lead, Eli Parquet and McKinley Wright made all four of Colorado’s free throws to inch the stat to 82.3 percent.
If Colorado closes out the win, the record won’t be settled today. When I messaged Plutnicki about it last night after Oral Roberts won, he made clear he was paying close attention.
“.01 … We shall see,” he said.
March 20, 2021, 1:21 p.m. ET
Jacob Groves is on fire for Eastern Washington early against Kansas. If he borrowed a headband from his older brother Tanner, the Big Sky M.V.P., he’d be the second coming of Napoleon Dynamite.
March 20, 2021, 12:50 p.m. ET
Freshman Jabari Walker has already made a career-high four 3 pointers for Colorado and we still have about seven minutes left in the first half of this matchup.
March 20, 2021, 12:47 p.m. ET
One thing to remember about the N.C.A.A. tournament is that teams are preparing for opponents they haven’t seen before. If San Diego State looked like it hadn’t seen a zone defense all year against Syracuse last night, it’s because they hadn’t. Georgetown is getting a lesson on the craftiness of McKinley Wright, which Pac-12 schools have been learning for four years.
March 20, 2021, 12:43 p.m. ET
Former Georgetown great Dikembe Mutombo, now known to a younger generation as the guy in the Geico ads, is in the building supporting the Hoyas. His son, Ryan, is committed to Patrick Ewing’s squad for next season. Ewing said he also received messages from Michael Jordan, Larry Bird and Charles Barkley after winning the Big East tournament.
March 20, 2021, 12:30 p.m. ET
Colorado’s Evan Battey is the grandson of former Twins All-Star catcher Earl Battey, who was known for his rocket arm (he threw out 44 percent of would-be base stealers for his career) and toughness on some of the great Twins teams in the 60s, including the one that lost to the Dodgers in seven games in the 1965 World Series.
March 20, 2021, 12:11 p.m. ET
As in recent years, the men’s games will be broadcast on CBS, TBS, TNT and TruTV. The official way to stream the tournament is through the N.C.A.A.’s March Madness Live app, which requires logging in through a TV provider. (The Paramount+ app, formerly known as CBS All Access, will also carry games broadcast on CBS.)
Here’s a look at the men’s bracket and the schedule for Saturday (all times Eastern):
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No. 12 seed Georgetown vs. No. 5 seed Colorado, 12:15 p.m.
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No. 13 seed UNC Greensboro vs. No. 4 seed Florida St., 12:45 p.m.
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No. 14 seed Eastern Washington vs. No. 3 seed Kansas, 1:15 p.m.
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No. 9 seed St. Bonaventure vs. No. 8 seed Louisiana State, 1:45 p.m.
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No. 16 seed Texas Southern vs. No. 1 seed Michigan, 3 p.m.
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No. 12 seed U.C. Santa Barbara vs. No. 5 seed Creighton, 3:30 p.m.
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No. 15 seed Iona vs. No. 2 seed Alabama, 4 p.m.
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No. 11 seed Drake vs. No. 6 seed Southern California, 4:30 p.m.
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No. 15 seed Grand Canyon vs. No. 2 seed Iowa, 6:25 p.m.
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No. 10 seed Maryland vs. No. 7 seed UConn, 7:10 p.m.
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No. 13 seed Ohio vs. No. 4 seed Virginia, 7:15 p.m.
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No. 9 seed Missouri vs. No. 8 seed Oklahoma, 7:25 p.m.
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No. 16 seed Norfolk St. vs. No. 1 seed Gonzaga, 9:20 p.m.
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No. 11 seed U.C.L.A. vs. No. 6 seed Brigham Young, 9:40 p.m.
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No. 14 seed Abilene Christian vs. No. 3 seed Texas, 9:50 p.m.
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No. 10 seed Virginia Commonwealth vs. No. 7 seed Oregon, 9:57 p.m.
March 20, 2021, 11:27 a.m. ET
The Bulldogs are the top overall seed and enter the tournament at 26-0. They are the first team since Kentucky in 2015 to come into the tournament unbeaten. Kentucky, which featured nine future N.B.A. players, rolled to 38-0 that season before losing in the national semifinals to Wisconsin at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis.
Before that, Jerry Tarkanian’s Nevada-Las Vegas Runnin’ Rebels were the last unbeaten team to reach the Final Four in 1991 before falling to Christian Laettner, Bobby Hurley and Duke in the national semifinals at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis.
To become the first undefeated champion since Indiana in 1976, the Bulldogs must reel off six wins in the next three weeks — also in Indianapolis — beginning Saturday night against Norfolk State, which beat Appalachian State, 54-53, Thursday.
Gonzaga Coach Mark Few’s team features three finalists — Corey Kispert, Jalen Suggs and Drew Timme — for the John R. Wooden Award as the nation’s top player, while the team’s fourth best player, Joel Ayayi, notched the only triple-double in program history.
If Gonzaga can win six straight, it will be 32-0 — just like Bob Knight’s Indiana team.
“Heck yeah, we want to win a national championship,” Few said Sunday on ESPN. “But every darn game, we have to be ready to go, and we have to play really, really well, including this first one.”
March 20, 2021, 11:27 a.m. ET
Georgetown had to do a lot of winning to even end up in this position. The Hoyas upset Creighton in the Big East title game in a 24-point rout, and before that they topped Villanova.
None of that was supposed to happen.
Now the run has Georgetown as the most popular No. 12 seed selected to win its first-round game against fifth-seeded Colorado, according to ESPN and Yahoo entries.
Given that the Hoyas were projected to finish dead last in the Big East, the run has been more than just a couple of conference tournament upsets. It has also been a big deal for Patrick Ewing, who has said the run has helped him gain some respect as a coach.
Georgetown’s 3-point shooting is dangerous and Dante Harris, who is from the District of Columbia, has emerged as a budding star after Jalen Harris left the program a few games in.
More than 40 percent of ESPN and Yahoo brackets picked Georgetown for the win on Saturday — and about 14 percent even have the Hoyas in the Sweet 16.
March 20, 2021, 11:26 a.m. ET
Michigan Coach Juwan Howard is the first person to coach a No. 1 seed in the tournament who also played for a No. 1 seed in the tournament during his playing career.
He played in two national title games with the Wolverines over his three seasons with the program, which he now coaches. The last time was in 1993, while Howard was a sophomore, and that was the last time Michigan had been a No. 1 seed. They lost in the championship game that season to North Carolina.
Michigan has been a No. 1 seed three times: Twice with Howard as a player, and once with him as a coach.
Howard was named the coach of the year by the United States Basketball Writers Association on Friday.
