No. 15-seed Princeton rallied from a 12-point deficit in the second half to upset No. 2 Arizona, 59-55, in the first round of the NCAA tournament
When it comes to playing the role of underdog, Princeton coach Mitch Henderson learned from the best. Playing for the legendary coach Pete Carril in 1996, he was a point guardthat knocked off defending national champion UCLA, 43-41 in one of the NCAA tournament’s greatest upsets.
“I thought it was going to be improbable,” Henderson said after the game. “We were down the whole game. That was awesome.” The Tigers have made 25 previous trips to March Madness, including one run to the Final Four in 1965. But Princeton hasn’t advanced past the first round since 1998, when they did so as a fifth seed, the program’s highest-ever place in the NCAA tournament.
“So much of what you see with us, the way we play, is what I’ve learned from Bill Carmody, Pete Carril, and modernized it,” Henderson said before the game. “Those guys are enormous and they’re fast,” Henderson said. He joked that his players would have to strap broomsticks to their hands to practice dealing with long-limbed menaces like Ballo and Tubelis in the NCAA tournament.On Thursday night, Arizona’s stars struggled to find a groove on offense, in part because the Tigers hogged so much clock on their own offensive possessions.
The Tigers instead showcased the enduring utility of their school’s traditional, balanced offense. With Evbuomwan working as a distributor out of the center of the floor, Princeton’s guards and wings screened away from the ball, working loose for shooting angles or creating space for Evbuomwan to drive and spin past his defender. At the crucial juncture, they also walled off the bigger Wildcats.
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