Coles hits late floater, TCU edges Arizona St in March Madness Minnesota hires West Virginia’s Plitzuweit to replace Whalen Bill Self to miss Kansas’ NCAA game against Arkansas Princeton women top NC State 64-63 in March Madness opener Florida Atlantic edges Memphis 66-65, first March Madness win Collins, Mississippi reach NCAA second round, beat Gonzaga

DENVER. Having watched from the bench for most of last season, Jacoby Coles patiently waited his turn.

His reward came Friday night, with a lane player with 1.5 seconds left to lift TCU from 6th to a 72-70 victory over 11th-ranked Arizona State in the first round of the NCAA Tournament.

“He didn’t have the role he wanted,” said Mike Miles Jr., the teammate who talked him into coming to TCU and fed him a pass that led to the winning bucket. “But this year he gets as many minutes as he wanted. He’s coming. In the most important game of his life, he made the winning shot.”

Coles took Miles’ pass from the top of the three-point circle, made one dribble, took two strides and missed the winner of the game.

A desperate throw by Arizona State quarterback Frankie Collins at the buzzer missed everything, and coach Bobby Hurley wondered if he should have used the timeout to set up the game.

“I’ll certainly think about it,” Hurley said.

While TCU (22-12) went out on Sunday to play Gonzaga, the Arizona State season ended on a heartbreak. No one could say that the Sun Devils (23-13) didn’t put on a show.

At the start of the second half, they took an 11-point lead, punctuated by a couple of flashy dunks. One was from Collins – with a fullback draped over him – and another from Dewan Cambridge, who completed the fast break with a powerful back kick.

That’s when the TCU started to chip off.

A pair of free throws from Damion Baugh and another from Miles gave the Horned Frogs a three-point lead with 24 seconds left.

DJ Horne, who finished with 17 points, responded with a deep 3-pointer to tie the score to 70 with 15 seconds left.

This only set the stage for Coles, who finished with 11 points.

“That was a good shot,” Coles said. “I’m happy for my team, I’m happy for the win.”

Miles, playing on an overstretched right knee, scored 26 points, including 12 of 14 from the free throw line.

He limped noticeably shortly after the dunk at the end of the first half. The coach greeted Miles as he left the court for a break but returned after the break. The Horned Frogs also needed him, as they played big game after big game. At the end of the game, he drew a key attack.

Miles missed several games in early February with an over-sprained right knee.

In regards to the last-second shot, TCU coach Jamie Dixon credited the victory to his team with only five assists, in line with their low level of the season. These losses resulted in only four ASU points.

Perhaps still a little tired from the trip from Dayton, Ohio, the Sun Devils took a moment to acclimatise. Seed 11 lost 11 before even sweating a lot. But they quickly found their rhythm – just as they did two days ago when they scored 98 points in the top four by beating Nevada.

“I’m heartbroken for my guys,” Hurley said. “They played basketball winning all year, played selflessly, fought and fought, and it took us a last-second throw to put us back.”

BIG PICTURE

Arizona State: The Sun Devils are definitely back on track after going 14-17 last season and 11-14 in 2020-21. When asked about the status of the program, Hurley replied, “Did you watch the game? This is the state of the program.”

TCU: The Horned Frogs improved to 7-9 all-time in the NCAA Tournament.

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TCU and Gonzaga have not met on the basketball court since the Horned Frogs won 90-87 on December 30, 1998. But Bulldogs coach Mark Few is highly respected. “I watched TCU a lot this year. I think they are just as good as a team as they are in this tournament, especially when they are at their peak,” said Fuu, whose team is third in the Western Region.

Minnesota hired West Virginia head coach Don Plitzuwait on Saturday to a six-year contract, turning to another leader with strong regional ties to try to lift a lagging program.

Plitzweit, who will replace Lindsay Whalen, has 16 years of experience as a 356-141 head coach at four schools. She spent just one season with the Mountaineers, who, after finishing 10th, lost in the first round of the NCAA Tournament to 7th-place Arizona on Friday.

Prior to that, Plitzuwait had taken South Dakota to the NCAA Tournament for four of her six seasons there. She was a three-time Major League Coach of the Year award winner along with the Coyotes who reached the Sweet 16 in 2022.

Plitzwait also spent four seasons in Northern Kentucky and five seasons in Grand Valley State, which won the 2006 NCAA Division II National Championship. Between these stops, she was an assistant in Michigan.

The 50-year-old West Bend, Wisconsin native has also worked as an assistant at the Michigan Institute of Technology, Wisconsin and Green Bay.

“It’s kind of a homecoming, and Minnesota is a program that I’m very familiar with from my previous time in the area and in the Big Ten,” Plitzuwait said in a statement. “I look forward to returning to the area and meeting the team, alumni and fans. I also look forward to meeting local school and club coaches. I can’t wait to get to work.”

The university has scheduled a press conference on Monday afternoon to introduce Plitzuweit. The terms of her contract were not immediately available. Whalen’s base salary this season was $547,000.

Whalen’s departure was described by Minnesota athletic director Mark Coyle as a mutual decision, but it seemed that she was not ready to leave. She was scheduled to appear at a press conference with Coyle on March 2 when the change was announced, but later said she was too emotional to participate.

Whalen was hired five years ago with no coaching experience. But she’s a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame and led her home state Gophers to their only Final Four appearance as a player in 2004, then starred for the Minnesota Lynx in the WNBA and for the US National Team in 2004. Olympic Games.

Whalen went 71-76 with Minnesota, including a 32-58 record in the Big Ten game and no NCAA tournament appearances. The Gophers made two NCAA appearances in four years under Whalen’s predecessor, Marlene Stallings, their only appearance in the past 14 seasons.

This season, Whalen brought in highly regarded freshmen with four players from the state, including top scorer Mara Brown. The Gophers’ 11–19 season ended with a first-round loss to Penn State in the Big Ten on Wednesday. They finished 12th in the Big Ten with a 4-12 record, their fewest wins in 12 years.

Plitzweit will become the 13th head coach in the history of the Gophers program. Her teams have been fifth or higher in the regular season conferences in all 16 seasons as a coach, including 11 top-three finishes.

“We’re all set,” Coyle said in early March. “There is no reason why it cannot be done here. That’s the question we need to find out.”

As a player, Plitzuwait was a two-time Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Player of the Year at Michigan Institute of Technology, appearing in the NCAA Division II Tournament four times.

She and her husband Jay have a son, AJ, who plays for South Dakota and a daughter, Lexie, who plays for Grand Valley State.

DEMOINES, Iowa — Bill Self will miss the second round of the NCAA Tournament against Arkansas on Saturday in No. 1 Kansas, the school announced.

Self, who is recovering from heart surgery earlier this month, has been with his team since they arrived in Des Moines and has been attending meetings and practices.

Self declined to comment on Friday as he walked past reporters after practice, but said in a radio interview ahead of the Jayhawks’ first-round win over Howard that he was feeling better and getting stronger — just not ready to sit on the bench before the game yet. .

Norm Roberts, Self’s longtime assistant, will take over as coach for Game 5.

Self went to the emergency room on the night of March 8, shortly after seeing the Jayhawks conduct a final shootout ahead of the Big 12 quarter-finals. He complained of chest tightness and balance problems, and the 60-year-old man had two stents placed to treat clogged arteries.

Kansas leads 3-1 in Self’s absence and Texas lost in the Big 12 Tournament championship.

Roberts, 57, is Self’s right-hand man and has worked on Self’s staff for four practices.

“We’ve been together for almost 25 years, so we’re probably finishing each other’s sentences in basketball terms,” ​​Roberts said Friday.

SALT LAKE CITY — Grace Stone has made a habit of winning jumpers for the Princeton Tigers.

She has ice in her veins. She has that look in her eyes and you know what she’s going to play. She’s going to hit,” Princeton coach Carla Berube said.

Stone scored 22 points, including her fifth 3-pointer of the game with 4.7 seconds left, to lift No. 10 Princeton to a thrilling 64-63 victory over North Carolina State in the first round of the NCAA Women’s Tournament on Friday night. .

“I made that shot last game and my teammates have complete confidence in me,” said Stone, who struck game winners against Columbia and Rhode Island earlier this season.

Caitlin Chen, who also scored 22 points, made a three-pointer with 55 seconds left to close the Tigers’ lead to 63–61, and then Madison St. Rose and Stone made a last-minute interception to give the Tigers. chance.

On the last possession in North Carolina State, the Tigers caused chaos—as they had done throughout the game—and kicked the ball out to prevent the seventh seeded Wolf Pack from making a hit.

St. Rose “grabbed the ball with her hand and then I think everyone dived for the ball,” said Berube, who then got wet at the “water party” in the dressing room and held her press conference all wet.

Tigers (24-5),…