SALT LAKE CITY – The Wichita State Shockers pulled one of the biggest shocks of the NCAA tourney, knocking off top-ranked, top-seeded Gonzaga 76-70. Their team, coaches and fans danced with their band, Lets Go Shockers. After all, it is the Big Dance, and they had earned this dance.
Despite a partisan crowd of 16,060 at EnergySolutions Arena, they stunned the country's No. 1 team in a third-round West Region game. They booked their ticket to the Sweet 16 in Los Angeles Thursday against the winner of Sunday's All-Cinderella matchup between 13th-seeded LaSalle and 12th-seeded Ole Miss.
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Carl Hall Wichita State dunks the ball in the first half.
Ninth-seeded Wichita State (28-8) got 16 points each from Ron Baker and Cleanthony Early, but held Gonzaga to 35.6 percent shooting to get the upset.
Top-seeded Gonzaga (32-3) featured 7-foot junior Kelly Olynyk, a long-haired Canadian that nbadraft.net tabs as a lottery pick should he choose to leave school early. And he excelled at times, with a game-high 26 points and nine rebounds; but other than Kevin Pangos (19 points) got little support.
Their Cinderella status has long since given way to expectations, and their string of 15 straight NCAA trips beg the question of whether they actually should've won more. Have the Zags disappointed?
The team coach Mark Few had called his best will clearly head home disappointed after Saturday night, chants of overrated still ringing and yet another NCAA tourney disappointment stinging.
Since those three consecutive Sweet 16 berths from 1999-2001, they've only danced into the second week twice, and lost to worse-seeded teams four times since 2002. No, make that five after Saturday night.
The Zags had been stamped as beatable and vulnerable, after 16th-seeded Southern took them to the brink on Thursday. Twitter had labeled them as frauds and unworthy of their lofty No. 1 seed.
Wichita State led 26-13 on Baker's 3-pointer with 7:01 left in the half; but Gonzaga rallied. They were within 41-37 early in the second half, and reeled off a dozen unanswered points to seize the momentum.
Mike Hart's left-corner 3-pointer gave the Zags a 43-41 lead and sent the Shockers scurrying for a timeout with 13:30 to play, but it didn't help. Olynyk hit an 18-foot jumper, and followed with a pair of foul shots to go up 47-41. And when Wichita State's Carl Hall committed an ill-advised goaltend on Pangos, it was 49-41 with 11:53 remaining.
With Gonzaga still leading 61-54, Early drilled a dead-on 3, and then Baker hit a deep 3 with not one but two Zags in his face to get the Shockers within 61-60. Hall's jumper put the Shockers back up with 3 ½ left.
Elias Harris' free throws gave Gonzaga the lead again with 3:17 on the clock.
But Baker hit a pair on the other end to give the Shockers the lead, and after David Stockton committed a turnover – his father John looking on from the stands in the city he forged a Hall of Fame career in with the Jazz – Baker caught a pass from Fred Vanvleet and drilled a huge right-corner 3-pointer for a 67-63 lead.
After Kelly Olynyk's jumper, Vanvleet hit a 3-pointer to push the Shockers' cushion up to 70-65 with 1 ½ minutes left. Olynyk's missed layup on the other end made the clock Gonzaga's enemy.
Vanvleet calmly sank a pair of free throws to make it 72-65 with just 38.6 remaining, and they held on from there.
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