The name of the game come March is 'survive and advance' and that's what No. 2 seed Arizona (27-8) did winning 78-68 over Dayton (25-8) in a gritty game. The Wildcats were up by as much as 17-points in the first half, but a 10-0 run by the Flyers got them back into the game. It got as close as a 52-49 with 12 minutes left.
"Really proud of our guys. Dayton's a heck of a ball club. I was hoping that we could really come out and get after them defensively and really just play with a bunch of active energy and kind of get them on their heels, and we did, said coach Tommy Lloyd during the postgame press conference.
"Unfortunately, they responded. But that's how these games go. We've been really talking about just being steady, staying locked in. Obviously, not getting too high, not getting too low. As a staff, we have a pretty active, emotional staff so we talked about us kind of taking a breath and just helping our guys stay in that zone."
But, the Wildcats were able to go on a 14-2 and retaking control of the game building a 66-51 lead over Dayton. This was in large part to the play of the bench, which outscored the Flyers 23-2, highlighted by guard Jaden Bradley, who went off for nine of his 12 points in the second half.
"I thought J.B. [Bradley] was doing a really good job of the pressure up top, handling it, not panicking. Even kind of went at 'em a couple times," said Lloyd on Bradley's game. "Those are high-risk plays when you're attacking a press like that. But you want to go downhill with the press before they can set their defense."
With the Win, the Wildcats advance to the Sweet Sixteen for the second time in the Lloyd era and will be awaiting the winner of the Baylor-Clemson game.
As a unit, Arizona shot 53% from the field and stayed hot at the 3-point line. knocking in eight triples and shooting 44% from deep. It was guard Caleb Love, who scored a team-high 19 points and hit three of the eight shots from beyond the arc.
The main reason for Dayton climbing back into the game during the 10-0 run was the high turnover number. The Wildcats turned the ball over 11 times, which led to nine points for the Flyers.
"That's key, staying calm in those moments when they're making a run. Not panicking," said Love. "We stuck to the plan, like J.B. [Bradley] said, and we got the job done."
The team was able to address those issues and finished the game with 15 turnovers with only four coming in the second half. And during that time, Bradley was the main ball handler for the team and finished the game with zero turnovers.
Although the Wildcats won the battle in the paint 38 to 32, not a lot of those points came from center Oumar Ballo, who had eight points in the first half. Ballo was limited in his minutes in the second half and finished with 22 minutes of action finishing with eight points and three rebounds on 4 of 5 shooting.
Instead, Lloyd went small moving Keshad Johnson to the center position and going with Pelle Larsson and KJ Lewis at the forward spots.
This game Arizona the ability to match up better with Dayton big man, DaRon Holmes, who finished the game with 23 points. However, in the second half after the adjustment by Lloyd, Holmes had to work to get his points and went 3 of 10 from the field and put up nine points.
"Our plan with Big O [Ballo] got us off to a good start early. They got comfortable and started attacking a little bit," said Lloyd. "I wanted to give them a different look. I think we did it right before a media, because I wanted to get a look at it, and then it worked. We got a turnover the first time we did it."
I said, hey, let's ride this out and see if we can change the course of the game. They had to start attacking us differently and get them out of their rhythm.
Holmes walked away going 8 of 17 from the field with 11 rebounds and four assists and he recorded a double-double.
With Johnson at the center position, he was able to make the impact Arizona needed on defense, but also added 13 points and 7 rebounds while going 6 of 10 from the field.
Not only was the defensive adjustment felt in the paint against Holmes, but it made an impact on the perimeter giving the Wildcats the ability to close out on 3-point shooters fast.
Dayton finished the game going 7 of 24 from deep, but only made two 3-point buckets in the second half after going 5 of 15 during the first half.
The winner of the Baylor-Clemson game will face Arizona in the Sweet Sixteen in Los Angeles inside Crypto.com Arena with a spot in the Elite Eight on the line. The Wildcats will be looking to make their first trip to the four round since the 2014-15 season when the team lost a heart breaking 81-73 game to Wisconsin.
> DISCUSS the article with other Arizona fans Inside McKale
> WATCH the latest videos from GOAZCATS.com and subscribe to our YouTube channel
> FOLLOW us on Twitter (@goazcatscom, @MattRMoreno, @THutch1995)
> FOLLOW us on Instagram (@goazcats)
> LIKE us on Facebook
> SUBSCRIBE for all the latest Arizona Wildcats team and recruiting news (subscribe now)
