Kansas rides huge nights from McCormack, Agbaji to knock off Villanova 81-65 in Final Four

The Jayhawks got a pair of 20-point performances from their best players to propel them to their first title game since 2012.

In the biggest moments, you want your best players to have their biggest games.

For the Kansas Jayhawks, seniors David McCormack and Ochai Agbaji lived up to the billing, propelling KU to an 81-65 win over the Villanova Wildcats in the Final Four Saturday night.

McCormack posted not just one of his best games of the season, but arguably the best and certainly the most impactful of his four-year career. He set a new season high against Villanova with 25 points on an especially efficient 10-of-12 (83.3%) shooting from the field. That was also the second-most points he’s ever scored in a game in his career.

He also collected nine rebounds for the game, KU’s second-highest mark.

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“Just talking with coach, he wanted us to have an inside presence, and usually if you can play inside/out it opens up more shots, more driving lanes, a lot of cuts,” McCormack said. “And I think starting off early on it opened the rest of the floor up and we played off of that and made it easy.”

This has been an up-and-down year for McCormack, who earned third-team All-Big 12 honors but also had some memorable down moments over the course of the season. For Kansas coach Bill Self, though, he knew his senior big man was capable of this kind of performance.

“I don't look at it that way at all, ‘sticking with him,’” Self said. “He was our guy from the jump. And I think so much of a performance maybe has to do with things that the media and the public doesn't know about, and primarily health.”

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As for Agbaji, who had been somewhat maligned in the early part of the NCAA tournament for some strugglesome shooting, was electrifying offensively, specifically from the perimeter. The consensus All-American went 6-of-7 from three-point range and tallied 21 points for the game.

Playing loose and relaxed was one of the keys to Agbaji’s big night.

“In warmups and everything, having all the shootarounds, everything leading up to the game, just felt relaxed,” Agbaji said. “Everyone on our team did, relaxed but still confident and ready to attack the game.”

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While those two were the game’s top performers, junior Christian Braun and sophomore Jalen Wilson played key supporting roles in the victory.

Braun wasn't a factor at all offensively to open the game, going scoreless in the first half, but came up clutch after the break with 10 second-half points. That included two three pointers late in the game to help quell Villanova's late-game runs.

Wilson, meanwhile, provided yet another double-double, his third of the tournament. He scored 11 points and hauled in a game-high 12 rebounds.

He’s averaging a double-double for the tournament, too, with 11.4 points and 10.8 rebounds per game to his credit in that stretch.

As a team, the Jayhawks shot 53.7% from the floor overall and 54.2% from three. The Wildcats were held to just 38.6% shooting and under 42% from deep.

Villanova mounted a couple of formidable runs and got the game down to a six-point deficit in the second half at 64-58 with just 6:10 to play.

The Jayhawks, though, found a way to squash each of those threats to their lead, combining their high-powered offense and just enough stifling defense.

“All year we've been in a lot of these situations in the Big 12,” Braun said. “We played a lot of games that were really close down the stretch. Everybody's pretty confident in each other. And guys like Dave and Ochai had it going today, so we always had an answer.”

This win was an important one for Kansas, but Self’s squad is still 40 minutes away from their ultimate goal, the program’s sixth overall national title and fourth in the NCAA tournament era. KU will face the winner of the Duke-North Carolina Final 4 game for the national championship on Monday night, with tip scheduled for 8:20 p.m. central time.