Arizona and Iowa State are two of the top teams in the nation. It’s not surprising a postseason “final four” funneled them into a marquee matchup.
This isn’t the Final Four either program aspires to reach. The top-seeded Wildcats and the fifth-seeded Cyclones clash in the Big 12 semifinals on Friday night with a tournament championship game appearance on the line.
Arizona is projected to be a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament. Beating Iowa State would probably unofficially seal it.
Wildcats coach Tommy Lloyd refuses to get caught looking that far ahead. He wants to finish navigating a tough conference tournament bracket.
“It’s a monster. It’s a monster,” Lloyd said of navigating the Big 12 conference tournament. “We’ve been in it two years. Every game’s tough. There’s no easy games.”
The Wildcats (30-2), ranked No. 2 in the Top 25, have won seven straight games after routing eighth-seeded UCF 81-59 in Thursday’s quarterfinals. Iowa State (27-6) also won by 22 points as the No. 7-ranked Cyclones outclassed fourth-seeded Texas Tech 75-53 for their third straight win.
The teams met once in the regular season with Arizona recording a 73-57 home victory on March 2.
Big 12 Player of the Year Jaden Bradley scored 17 points for the Wildcats in that meeting. Meanwhile, Iowa State shot just 29.2% from the field and 7 of 30 from 3-point range and was outrebounded 40-33.
“(It’s) not too long ago that we went down to Tucson,” Cyclones coach T.J. Otzelberger said. “And you know that was a game that, truthfully, we weren’t within striking distance for certainly the majority of the second half. We know what a great team they are. I mean, they’ve had one of the best regular seasons of any team in the country.”
Lloyd said his coaching staff would study that recent victory while putting together the game plan.
“We’ll obviously look back at that and see what worked and what didn’t work and see what kind of adjustments we can make,” Lloyd said. “But we have a lot of respect for Iowa State and their program, and I have a lot of respect for T.J. and the job that he’s doing, and I have a lot of respect for their players.
“Like I said, we’re looking forward to the challenge. We’re looking forward to the opportunity.”
The Cyclones have won their first two games by a combined 71 points with their 49-point, second-round victory over Arizona State on Wednesday setting a Big 12 tourney record for largest winning margin.
Joshua Jefferson posted double-doubles in both victories and had 18 points, 13 rebounds and six assists in the win over Texas Tech when Iowa State had a 39-29 rebounding edge.
“The rebounding battle is the most important thing on the court,” Jefferson said. “I think when we do that to the highest level, we’re going to come out victorious.”
Tamin Lipsey made four 3-pointers and scored 20 points against the Red Raiders. He said there was no panic when Texas Tech came out hot and took a 17-5 lead.
“Just knowing it’s a long game, it’s a 40-minute game,” Lipsey said. “They came out right away and made some shots. But we knew we would hit some shots down the road. Just kept playing defense and hit some shots.”
Arizona also was hot at the outset of its game, building a 35-8 lead with 7:38 left in the first half.
Brayden Burries scored 21 points to lead the way as the Wildcats moved on.
“The objective in these tournaments is to get to the next one,” Lloyd said, “and that’s mission accomplished.”
