Gloomy Video

Again, props to SoCalwarrior for shooting some footage. Filed under "sad but true."

Time to exhale: Marquette advances in the NCAA Tournament

Marquette fought off Kentucky in the final minutes to notch their first NCAA tournament victory in the post-Wade era, winning by a final score of 74-66. With the victory Marquette advances to play the Stanford Cardinal on Saturday in Anaheim.

Jerel McNeal hit for 20 points (8-15 shooting), and Lazar Hayward netted 16 points (7 -11 shooting). Dominic James added 15 points and three assists (and zero turnovers in 29 minutes). Marquette shot 44% for the game.

Marquette led by as many as 11 in the second half, but Wildcat Joe Crawford had the game of his life, hitting 35 points, keeping UK in the game longer than expected.

With just about five minutes remaining, the Wildcats cut the lead to just three at 56-53 when Dominic James delivered in the game's key sequence. Following an offensive rebound by Dan Fitzgerald, James drilled an open three-pointer with 4:23 remaining to boost the MU lead to 59-53. After a UK miss, James took advantage of Ramel Bradley's tentative defensive play with four fouls to drive past the UK guard for the layup, stretching the Marquette lead to 61-53 with 3:14 to play.

Wesley Matthews sealed the win by sinking eight consecutive free throws in the last 30 seconds of the game. Matthews finished with 13 points. Overall, MU was an impressive 23-29 from the charity stripe on the afternoon.

Note to teams playing at the Honda Center, the games are being played under "West Coast Rules" whereby intentional fouls don't exist. Twice in the last minute, UK purposely fouled Dwight Burke, the worst FT shooter on the court, far far away from the ball. Twice, the refs applied West Coast Rules and neglected to call an intentional. Oh, well.

Tipoff for the MU-Stanford game is TBD -- either 5pm or 8pm.

This day has been a long time coming, and I've been dreading it all season. Lose, and we're one and done once again. Win, and we've got the monkey off our backs. I hardly slept last night, but I woke up believing this was our day.

I admit, it was very odd seeing Marquette's name on a bracket line to the right. LET'S GO WARRIORS!

AP Wrap / Official Box

Marquette Press Conference:

Now that's more like it: MU Thumps #22 Pitt

UPDATED:

Starting from the last 3 minutes of the Notre Dame game, through Seton Hall, and into an electric Bradley Center on Saturday Night versus #22 Pittsburgh, Marquette has played 83 minutes of inspired basketball with a 72-54 beat down of Pitt. Marquette now moves to 8-5 in BE play, in 5th place.

Jerel McNeal led the team with 17 quiet points, followed by a superlative effort by The Oooze, who racked up another double double, 14 points, 12 boards.

But they weren't the only stars last night, in that, MU got solid contributions from just about everyone. While James only had 4 points, he had a whopping 12 assists. Matthews accounted for another 10 points. And the Cube is back, with 13 points, hitting 3-5 from behind the arc.

The only minor disappointment last night was Trevor Mbakwe, who played his first minutes as a Warrior. With the expectation that Trevor farts thunder and craps lightening, his grand un-redshirting was uneventful at best, missing one shot, and getting zero boards in 8 minutes. If the game was tighter, I don't believe Crean would have played him for more than 1-2 minutes.

A note should be made about the crowd .. it was fantastic. Raucous. Students filled their section to the brim. That crowd went to 11. Some of it was for Pittsburgh, some for the Converse commercial, some for the Final 4 ceremony, and some for the Mbakwe unveiling. It will be interesting to see the Converse commercial, once complete. I thought the Bradley Center could have done a better job informing the non-students (who make up 75% of the crowd) what was going on, and to join in with the We Are--Marquette chant. I'll have video up later today.

Huge win. Next up, @SJU and home vs. Rutgers. Can you smell a 4 game winning streak?

One more item: Could Pitt fans be bigger a-holes? Quote: "Please let James have a broken wrist" and .. "I hope James has to have his hand amputated." Wow. Classy fan base.

• Game photos
  
• Recap / Box Score / Play by Play
• Rosiak's Recap
  

I need to put up a picture of a guy who sits a row behind me. Clearly, he reads Cracked Sidewalks.

I give you, the Cracked Sidewalks Fan of the Game: