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Ali strikes again as UNI upsets top-seeded Kansas, 69-67
Northern Iowa guard comes up clutch for second time in three days as Panthers head to first Sweet Sixteen in program history
UNI guard Ali Farokhmanesh and forward Adam Koch celebrate after beating Kansas in Saturday’s second round NCAA Tournament game at the Ford Center in Oklahoma City. UNI upset No. 1 seed Kansas 69-67 to advance to the Sweet 16.
Saturday, March 20, 2010 | 8 p.m.
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OKLAHOMA CITY — On Thursday night, taking an open 25-foot 3-point try in the closing seconds of a tied game against UNLV was a no-brainer for Northern Iowa's Ali Farokhmanesh.
Two days later, an attempted trey in the final minute may have looked like a questionable decision to many.
But not to the Northern Iowa senior guard.
"It just happened," he said. "I just shot it. It was an out-of-body experience. I don't even remember it going in."
If he really didn't truly remember it, chances are Farokhmanesh will see replays of it for the rest of his life, as his second clutch trifecta of the weekend provided a dagger to the heart of the No. 1 overall seed in this year's NCAA tournament.
After dumping Kansas in Oklahoma City, 69-67, Northern Iowa will now head to St. Louis next week for its first Sweet Sixteen appearance in program history.
"We've played a lot of close games," said Farokhmanesh, who helped dust off UNLV in a 69-66 victory to open the Panthers' weekend two days earlier. "I think this team is just used to that pressure and having to end a game like that, so I think it helped us in that situation."
It was surprisingly not very close for the better part of Saturday's second-round showdown, as Northern Iowa raced to a 36-28 halftime lead, using timely 3-point shooting and hustle to stun the Jayhawks, who were essentially playing a home game in front of a partisan crowd of 15,587 at the Ford Center.
Farokhmanesh was 4-of-4 from the floor and hit all three of his tries from outside before the intermission. Midway through the second half, after UNI bumped its lead to as wide as 12 points, Kansas coach Bill Self finally had his team — which had a heavy athletic advantage across the board — apply pressure defense from end to end.
The heat turned up to its highest point when KU went on a 6-0 run late that spanned just 24 seconds and included two UNI turnovers on its own end of the floor.
The end of that run saw KU senior guard Sherron Collins make it a one-point game at 63-62 with 44 seconds to play.
Then, Kwadzo Ahelegbe threw an outlet pass up the floor to Farokhmanesh, who had to make a hurried decision.
As he quickly approached the 3-point arc on the right side, he took a jab-step with the ball, and KU defender Tyrel Reed quickly retreated from covering him to the basket, where a cutter was coming underneath for UNI.
That left the diminutive senior gunner open, toeing the line, in a 2-on-4 situation.
"I thought that was a better shot than we were probably going to be able to get," he said. "Wide open, in transition, thought I might as well take that one.
"If we didn't have a shot clock, I probably wouldn't have shot that."
But he did.
And the result was the same as it was the other night.
"If we got that 4-point lead, it was probably going to win us the game."
It sure did, as it rendered the final 30 seconds of the game clock moot. KU cut the deficit to three with less than 10 seconds to go, and Farokhmanesh fittingly sank two free throws to shut the door for good.
"I think hitting that shot the other day gave him that confidence, you know?" said teammate Marc Sonnen. "The pressure was kind of off. It was the same type of shot, so he knew he was going to go in and hit it."
The truth is that KU had played with fire for far too long.
Just like it had on Thursday against 16-seed Lehigh, the Jayhawks fell to a quick 12-4 deficit. But unlike the Mountain Hawks, the Panthers had the depth, talent, defense and experience to make it stick.
Plus, UNI was no stranger to pressure. It's slowed-down pace and defense-heavy approach lends itself to nail-biters on almost a weekly basis.
"We respect our opponents no matter what," Farokhmanesh said. "They're the No. 1 team in the country for a reason. At the same time, I think you can't build people up to be something that they're not.
"They're a great team, but if we look at them as Goliath, we're not going to have a chance against them."
Farokhmanesh scored 16 points, which led three Panthers in double figures. It came on 5-of-12 shooting, and before making his late gamble pay off, he had missed his first seven shot attempts of the second half, including six from long range.
Senior center Jordan Eglseder scored 14 points and hit two 3-pointers in a game for the first time in his career.
As a team, UNI was 9-of-26 from 3-point land, and after UNLV pressed its way to 16 Panther turnovers on Thursday, the Jayhawks simply turned up the pressure too late, only forcing nine.
Meanwhile, Collins — the winningest player in Kansas history — went down with a thud. He scored 10 points on just 4-of-15 shooting — including an 0-for-6 showing from deep — and had five turnovers to go with four assists and three rebounds.
KU was sloppy with the ball, committing 15 turnovers compared to just nine assists.
And with all of that, Northern Iowa suddenly becomes the darling of the NCAA tournament as it gets set to head into its second weekend.
The Panthers will get the winner between 4-seed Maryland and 5-seed Michigan Sate — who play tomorrow at 11:30 a.m. PDT in Spokane, Wash. — on Thursday evening in the regional semifinals.
At 30-4 now on the season, it may be somewhat ludicrous to call Ben Jacobson's club a "Cinderella." Some still probably will.
At this point, they don't really care.
"People can call us whatever they want," said junior forward Lucas O'Rear. "As far as we know, we're still UNI. We're gonna keep going out there and play that style of basketball."
Discussion: 21 comments so far…
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Rock Choke Jayhawk!
Good season. Kansas losing to your team makes the MWC at least represent. I know my LOBOS got beat bad but I think UW will be a good final 4 team.
Congratulations Panther's on defeating Kansas
Keep winning and get to the Final four
Agreed. Congrats to Northern Iowa.
Nice win by a very good UNI team. To think the Rebels played 'em straight up for 39.75 minutes! Keep your heads up Rebels! Here's to the future!
[SCHEDULING QUESTION] A little off topic but here's a thought for a story .... As a fan, I am curious as to the, 'who, what, when, where, how's and why's' that go into the process for scheduling the next basketball out-of-conference schedules. Commonsense tells us that logistics always comes into play but how hard does UNLV work at getting the schedule (or AVOIDING getting the schedule) to the level of a Gonzaga type program where they have the reputation of playing any 'big gun', anywhere at anytime?
My desire behind this question is that somehow a story or spotlight put on the process by the media would not only educate the fans but also might, hopefully put a little fuel on the fire to move the schedule beyond the Arizona's of the world and onto the Gonzaga's, Georgetown's, Villanova's of the basketball world. Ultimately, it will land UNLV the additional national coverage that goes along with that type of scheduling - right? I mean, we can play the Pittsburgh States till the cows come home but it does nothing more than pad our record and does not lend itself to gaining any national respect. When a Gonzaga type program goes out and plays competitively - win or lose - they EARN the respect of the national media, etc. We seem to 'hang our hats' on the L'Ville home and away series (which is great BTW) but then follow it up with a game against AT&T Tech from wherever.
Bottomline, just some random thoughts as I am curious as to how the process works and if you can "put the pressure" on the scheduling process from a media standpoint.
Nice post, scheduling non-conference opponents is huge, especially if you are a "bubble" team in March. Even if you are a solid bid, it helps greatly apparently with seeding when you have a strong non-conf SOS.
We already have Louisville, and the MVC vs. MWC series (as UNI is proving, the MVC is a pretty good conference). Would be great to see us get a game with another Big 12, Big 10, ACC even some of the top mid-major schools, e.g. Butler/Gonzag next season. National exposure and a good SOS will help in March 2011.
Obama correctly picked UNC to win it all last year. Some curse!
It couldve been us! OK, maybe not but still...
[SCHEDULING QUESTION] I know this is off-topic but we're moving more towards football season and I don't know how many more articles there will be on UNLV basketball so I want to get this in for Ryan Greene or whomever, to consider.
Just a quick add on:
With all of the experience coming back for UNLV, it seems that the time couldn't be any better then to double our schedule against power conference teams - win or lose - it can only help move our program to the next level for national respect and recruiting. For example --
Gonzaga's schedule representation for 2009-2010:
*Big 10 - 2 games
*Big 12 - 2 games
*Big East - 1 game
*Pac 10 - 1 game
*ACC - 2 games
*Plus two recent top teams (Davidson and Memphis)
RESULT: 8 wins, 3 losses, some outstanding media attention, respect and recruiting buzz.
UNLV's schedule representation for 2009-2010:
*WAC - 1 game
*Big East - 1 game
*Pac 10 - 2 games
*Big 12 - 1 game
RESULT: 3 wins, 2 losses, some sketchy media buzz and the hope of attracting local talent Corey Joseph.
I know we lost to K State but that ended up being considered a "good loss" as far as the national press/coaches pollsters are concerned. The risk remains for results like we had against USC. Still, if we are ever going to get to that "next level" we need to seriously consider taking more chances and beefing up the schedule. Ok, we can "tune-up" the team with an opening against Pittsburgh State and Reno, but after that, well, we should really ramp it up. Attracting a team to play here in Vegas with all the great hotels, etc., should be enticing - right? It would be great to see teams like Wake Forest, Georgetown, Gonzaga and Wisconsin on the schedule this fall along with our recent staples, L'Ville, ASU, AZ, K State and the MVC Challenge teams. Couple that with UNLV's participation in the ESPN 76 Classic the fall of 2010 and we would have quite a schedule. Again, with the experience that is coming back we should be competitive in every game! Cheers!
UNLV's schedule wasnt too bad this season, but i agree maybe a couple more high ranking teams is in order.
Here's a breakdown of the smaller teams this season:
UNR - always play them as in state rival
SIU - MVC team, was supposed to do a little better than they ended up
Holy Cross - Believe it or not, they were projected at the beginning of the season to win the patriot league
Santa Clara - Again, was supposed to do a bit better this year in the WCC with Gonzaga and St. Mary's
Southern Utah - No excuse for this game except they are in our backyard.
Weber State - Top of their league this season but lost to Montana in their conference tourney (NIT)
USC upstate - No excuse for this game either, and nowhere near us.
I agree, the Rebels should use their scheduling as their recruiting tool. We are not going to get any recognition nationally with the poor TV contract. Most schools still see a win against UNLV as pretty impressive, even in these down years. Now's the time to get that recognition back. I think we are falling into the mold of the rest of the MWC. Look at BYUs schedule, not one win against a top 25 team. Its no wonder they got man handled against KState. UNLV needs to get games that will peak interest nationally. Get WVU, Tennessee and the likes in the T&M. I would rather beat up on the low end of the Big Conferences than play teams like Holy Cross etc. Our win against AZ still looks better then any of those smaller team wins.
Good season.
Where's that Kansas fan that was talking smack when the Rebels lost to NIU? Probably crying himself to sleep.
Got to give it to those NIU kids. They are some scrappers.
Yeah Tarkus- Obamanation picked NC last year- BFD- so did 99.9% of America.
ESPN had KU in the sweet sixteen in 98% of all of their pickem brackets. So good luck to you if you are still in the office pool.
Glad I had KY in my bracket winning (vs Kansas St.) We'll see how that pans out.
Also, to "peak" interest is driving me crazy. You "pique" not peak. Spelling nazi inside me coming out.
"Yeah Tarkus- Obamanation picked NC last year- BFD- so did 99.9% of America."
Way to completely miss my point about the silly comment regarding a curse.
I was NOT referring to his prognostication skills, though he correctly called the UNLV loss, while virtually everyone here was calling him an idiot for predicting a UNI win. But again, that wasn't my point at all.
BTW, Sofakingbored, Nazi should be capitalized. ;)
I think UNLV needs to take the Gonzaga approach and play good teams on the road from big conferences. If you win its huge, if you lose, its not a huge deal if you're not expected to. Plus if you go on the road aginst a big team, there's an outside chance it gets on TV on a Network that people actually watch. There's a thought
UNLV-good team UNI-good team!"Parity i love it" DUDE FROM IOWA