| EAST REGIONAL: GEORGETOWN 66, VANDERBILT 65
In the big Georgetown moments this season, Jeff Green is always in the middle somewhere. Take the final seconds of Friday night's Sweet 16 game against Vanderbilt.
The Hoyas were down one with no timeouts and the clock ticking away. Green, the Big East Player of the Year, got the ball near the foul line and was double-teamed. He peeked to see if Patrick Ewing Jr. was open as he cut underneath the basket, but Ewing was locked up.
So Green took charge. He tried a spin move but lost the handle on the ball; he picked it up, tried again, and banked in a shot between two defenders with 2.5 seconds left.
Just like that, the Hoyas were 66-65 winners and in the NCAA Tournament quarterfinals for the first time since 1996. Georgetown will play the North Carolina-USC winner Sunday in the East Regional final.
"I like to have the ball in my hands because I have confidence that I can make plays," said Green, who had 15 points. "That was just a fumble play. I got lucky and it went in."
The second-seeded Hoyas (29-6) needed every last second to put away the No. 6 Commodores (22-12), who led by as many as 12 in the first half and refused to fade even when Georgetown's 7-2 center, Roy Hibbert, snapped to life at the beginning of the second half.
Hibbert had only three points and three rebounds in 14 first-half minutes, playing as invisibly as his teammates did at times and they trailed 32-24 at the half. The Hoyas shot just 8-for-24 from the field, rarely looking inside for either Hibbert or Green, who had only four at the break.
"We changed some things [at halftime], but for the most part, we just made it harder for them to score," Hoyas coach John Thompson III said. "This group always feels comfortable where we are. It might sound crazy, but we were comfortable [down eight at the half]."
The Hoyas felt better when Hibbert opened the second half with a one-handed putback slam, one of 16 offensive rebounds Georgetown gathered. Hibbert had 12 points and 10 rebounds, but Georgetown never led by more than three points in the second half.
So as Hibbert picked up fouls, the Commodores gained confidence. Their leading scorer, senior Derrick Byars, got Hibbert out of the game with 3:58 left and Vanderbilt up 58-57.
"He was a load down there in the paint and he kind of exerted his will in the second half," said Byars, who had 17 points. "We thought when we got him out that we were in good shape."
Even without making a field goal in the final 4:45. Vandy fell behind 64-61 on Jonathan Wallace's jumper with 1:03 to go, but Byars made two free throws with 48.8 to go to cut it to one. Ewing missed a 16-footer at the other end and Dan Cage, who had 17 points, seven rebounds, four assists and three steals, embellished a shove by Hoyas freshman DaJuan Summers to get two more free throws with 17.9 seconds to go. Cage hit them both and Vanderbilt was up one.
But Green fought through a double-team to make the last one. He may have taken an extra step, but no one cared to discuss it afterward. "I'm not going to take away from the dignity of this game. He made a great shot," Vanderbilt coach Kevin Stallings said. "I haven't seen a replay. I don't care to."
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