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Pac-12 in NCAA Tournament: Arizona State and USC Eliminated

Three of the four Pac-12 teams in the tournament fail to make it to the second round after the Sun Devils lose to TCU on a shot with 1.5 seconds left.
Jake Curtis|
Pac-12 in NCAA Tournament: Arizona State and USC Eliminated
Pac-12 in NCAA Tournament: Arizona State and USC Eliminated

The first weekend of the NCAA tournament is only half over and the Pac-12 has just  one team still alive.

JaKobe Coles made a 10-foot floater in the lane with 1.5 seconds left to give sixth-seeded TCU a 72-70 victory over 11th-seeded Arizona State in a first-round game of the NCAA tournament Friday night in Denver.

That loss as well as USC's 72-62 loss to Michigan State earlier Friday and Arizona's stunning loss to Princeton on Thursday mean that three of the four Pac-12 teams in the Big Dance did not make it to the second round.  UCLA is the only Pac-12 team still standing, and the Bruins will face Northwestern in a second-round game Saturday..

TCU 72, Arizona State 70

The Sun Devils (23-13) led for most of the second half and looked like they would win their second game in three days when they took an 11-point lead with 16:31 left in the second half.

Even after TCU (22-12) tied the game at 54-54 with 9:10 remaining, the Sun Devils regained control and held an eight point advantage at 65-57 with 4:38 remaining.

But TCU tied the game again on Damion Baugh's three pointer at the 1:48 mark.

After ASU failed to score on its next two possessions, TCU took a two-point lead when Baugh sank two free throws with 34.7 seconds left. After ASU's Frankie Collins missed a contest layup attempt, Mike Miles Jr., who finished with 26 points for TCU, made one of two free throws with 24.1 seconds to go to make it a three-point margin.

ASU's DJ Horne, who finished with 17 points, made his fourth three-pointer in five attempts with 15.6 seconds left to tie the game at 70-70.

After a TCU timeout with 12.4 seconds to play, Coles got the ball on the perimer and maneuvered his way into the lane before putting up a 10-foot floater.  It fell through with 1.5 seconds left for the game-winner.

It ended the season for ASU, which had rolled past Nevada in the play-in game on Wednesday in Dayton, Ohio, before making the 1,100-mile flight to Denver for Friday's game.

Desmond Cambridge Jr. scored 10 points for the Sun Devils but he was just 4-for-15 from the field, while Warren Washington had 11 points.

Chuck O'Bannon Jr. inished with 15 pointys for TCU, while Coles had 11.

ASU was flying high early in the second half with a pair of highlight-reel dunks.

Frankie Collins poster dunk early in the second half

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And that was followed moments later by Devan Cambridge's breakaway showpiece dunk:

Michigan State 72, USC 62

With its loss in Columbus, Ohio, USC has now lost in the first round of the NCAA tournament two years in a row after reaching the Elite Eight in 2021.

Michigan State (20-12) did a good job of limiting USC's best offensive weapon, Booggie Ellis. The all-Pac-12 guard averaged 18.0 coming into the game, and had averaged 24.3 points over the previous seven games.  But against the Spartans, he scored just six points on 3-for-12 shooting, including 0-for-3 on three-pointers before fouling out in the closing seconds.

"I let my teammates down today," Ellis said. "I didn't make shots and they made things tough on me.

"I played a bit too fast, and that's on me."

Drew Peterson, the Trojans' second-highest scorer, was limited to 11 points on 4-for-10 shooting. If Ellis and Peterson combine for just 17 points and combine to go just 1-for-7 on three-pointers, USC is not going to win many games.

USC (22-11) was tied with Michigan State at halftime, and was tied at 38-38 with 17:45 remaining in the second half.  However, Michigan State controlled the game from there.

A Joey Hauser three-pointer put the Spartans ahead by three points with 17:14 remaining, and the Spartans never relinquished the lead.

A run of eight straight points pushed the Spartans' lead to nine points, and although the Trojans got the margin down to four points, the Spartans quickly stretched the lead again and held a 15-point advantage with 4:24 remaining.

Joshua Morgan was averaging just 6.5 points, but he was USC's high corer with 14 on Friday.

Hauser, who was 4-for-6 on three-pointers, led Michigan State with 17 points. The rest of the Spartans were just 1-for-8 from beyond the arc, but they shot 52.5% on two-point attempts.

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Cover photo of Dsemond Cambridge Jr. by Michael Ciaglo, USA TODAY Sports

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Jake Curtis
JAKE CURTIS

Jake Curtis worked in the San Francisco Chronicle sports department for 27 years, covering virtually every sport, including numerous Final Fours, several college football national championship games, an NBA Finals, world championship boxing matches and a World Cup. He was a Cal beat writer for many of those years, and won awards for his feature stories.

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