SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Mike Krzyzewski slowly climbed up the ladder, bowed to the adoring Duke fans and then pointed to his players to give them the credit before cutting the final string of the net.
Coach K’s farewell tour will end at his record-setting 13th Final Four.
The Blue Devils delivered their most complete performance of this NCAA Tournament run to extend the career of their Hall of Fame coach for one more weekend after beating Arkansas 78-69 on Saturday night in the West Region final.
“To see the joy, I can’t explain it, because, you know, I’m a grandfather, I’ve lived through my daughters, I’m living through my grandchildren but now I’m living through these guys,” Krzyzewski said on the court before cutting down the net. “Holy mackerel!”
A.J. Griffin scored 18 points, West Region MVP Paolo Banchero added 16 and and second-seeded Duke (32-6) frustrated fourth-seeded Arkansas (28-9) on the offensive end to get back to the Final Four for the first time since Krzyzewski won his fifth championship in 2015.
Coach K will try to follow the path of the only coach to win more NCAA men’s titles as John Wooden won his 10th championship in his final season at UCLA in 1975. Krzyzewski broke the tie he had with Wooden for most Final Four appearances with the commanding win over the Razorbacks.
“I’m so happy. We call it crossing the bridge,” said Krzyzewski, who announced last summer this season would be his last. “There’s nothing like being a regional champ and going to the Final Four and playing on that Saturday with three other champions. It’s an amazing day.”
Duke’s upcoming matchup in New Orleans next Saturday will be historic either way — either its first NCAA Tournament meeting with archrival North Carolina or an unfathomable tangle in the national semifinals with 15th-seeded Saint Peter’s.
The Blue Devils were in control for most of the second half, using an 10-0 run after Arkansas had cut the deficit to five points early in the half to open up a big cushion. The spurt came following a timeout when Krzyzewski once again switched his team to an uncharacteristic zone after having success doing that in the Sweet 16 against Texas Tech.
“The zone helped, again,” Krzyzewski said. “They were really tough, they wear you out.”
Jaylin Williams ended that run with an emphatic dunk over Banchero for a three-point play but it wasn’t nearly enough for the Razorbacks, who didn’t cut the deficit into single digits until the final minute of the game.
Williams led Arkansas with 19 points and 10 rebounds and JD Notae had 14 points before fouling out. The Razorbacks shot 41.9% for the game but felt proud after turning their season around following an 0-3 start in the Southeastern Conference.
“We all wanted to get further in this, but the fight this team has showed all year has been incredible,” Williams said. “For the way that we started off conference, nobody would have expected us to get this far. So I just think that this team just kept fighting the whole year, the whole year, but, of course, we didn’t get where we wanted.”
Duke closed the first half on an 8-0 run to take a 45-33 lead at the break with Banchero hitting a 3-pointer to start the spurt. Trevor Keels hit another 3 from long range just before the buzzer.
Villanova 78, Houston 69
SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Villanova coach Jay Wright has won national championships with well-balanced and fundamentally sound teams, yet even he knew staying in contention for another title was going to take a rugged and exhaustive effort.
Ugly at times, the final result was beautiful for the Wildcats, who are going to their third Final Four in the past six NCAA Tournaments.
Jermaine Samuels had 16 points and 10 rebounds as Villanova grinded out a 50-44 victory over gritty and athletic Houston team in the South Region final Saturday.
“You just knew watching this team defensively, like you weren’t going to come out and just outscore them,” Wright said. “We really weren’t talking as much at the end about how we were going to score. We were talking about how we were going to stop them.”
Caleb Daniels added 14 points for the Wildcats (30-7), and fifth-year senior Collin Gillespie’s only made field goal was a clutch shot late, even though Villanova led throughout to clinch the first spot in this year’s Final Four in New Orleans.
“It was like playing against our own selves. They were just as physical as we were,” Daniels said. “It was a literal street fight, every possession trying to get a rebound.”
Villanova shot 28.8% from the field (15 of 52). The Cougars were only slightly better at 29.8% (17 of 57), missing their last five shots and 10 of 11 overall after cutting an 11-point second-half deficit to two. They made only one of their of 20 attempted 3-pointers in their lowest-scoring NCAA tourney game ever.
“We had it turned, we kept getting stops. We were getting stop, stop stop, we just weren’t scoring on the other end,” Houston coach Kelvin Sampson said. “I remember telling them in the huddle, I think it was a four-point game there … and we kept getting stops that somebody’s going to make a big shot. But we didn’t. Credit Villanova.”
The Wildcats, seeking their fourth championship overall, will play either Kansas, the only No. 1 seed remaining, or 10th-seeded Miami in a national semifinal next Saturday. They have won two championships in Wright’s 22 seasons, in 2016 and 2018.
“We couldn’t get Justin (Moore) or Collin in ball screens. They just took it away. We couldn’t get Justin and Collin in post-ups. They took it away. It was hard to even get them backdoor cuts,” Wright said. “They took away our two leading scorers, and other guys had to step up.”
Taze Moore had 15 points and 10 rebounds for the Cougars (32-6), who were denied making consecutive Final Four appearances for the first time since 1982-84 during the Phil Slama Jama era. The starting five was completely changed from last season, including Moore and two other senior newcomers.
After Villanova missed three shots on the same possession — and was still without any second-chance points in the game — Moore got the long rebound on the break. After initially slowing things down, Moore scored on a drive against Gillespie, getting Houston within 42-40 with 5:25 left.
It was the closest the Cougars had been in the game at AT&T Center, only about 200 miles from their campus, and the crowd was in a frenzy when Wright called timeout. Houston never got a chance to take the lead.
Gillespie, who played in the championship game for the Wildcats in 2018, was 1-of-6 shooting. But his only field goal came on the possession after the timeout when he waved off Samuels, stepped inside the 3-point line and hit a jumper with 5:02 left.
“It was an in-the-moment decision. They were soft-blitzing me basically the whole game. That time they just happened to switch,” Gillespie said. “So I wanted Jermaine to go down into the post. I had a mismatch … then Jermaine had a guard on him so he could rebound.”
There was a nearly two-minute scoring drought before Justin Moore made two free throws — the Wildcats were a perfect 15-of-15 from the line. A foul by J’Wan Roberts bailed them out with the shot clock about to run out. Those were Villanova’s first and only second-chance points.
Villanova had scored the first five points of the game, including a 3-pointer by Samuels on the first shot.
Samuels was also on that 2018 title team as a freshman with Gillespie, but the 6-foot-7 forward logged only one minute total while making late-game appearances in those two Final Four games.
As a senior, Samuels goes into the Final Four after being named MVP of the South Region. He is averaging 17.5 points a game in this NCAA tourney — so far.
Dubow reported from San Francisco, Hawkins from San Antonio.