Former Buckeye Roddy Gayle Jr. plays the role of hero while Michigan goes to Sweet 16

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For Roddy Gayle Jr.The negative discourse around his junior season began on April 21, 2024, the day he decided to move to Michigan and play for the new main coach Dusty May. Nothing was wrong with Gayle’s decision-Michigan is a great place for a student-sports school and May has taken his old team of Florida Atlantic, to the last four but every change in Ohio in Wolverines will be filled with surveillance. And Gayle spent the first two years of his career with the Buckeyses, whose fans were not delighted with his new site.

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Gayle quickly won the Michigan fans base with a series of impressive efforts in the first few weeks of the season. In his debut against Cleveland State, he scored 13 points and 11 points in the second game against Wake Forest. A few days later, in mid -November, he scored 10, 16 and 20 in consecutive trips, while proved to be a reliable shooter of the perimeter.

But the worship began to fade according to the last stages of the regular season, with Gayle receiving a hail criticism of fans when his percentages of shooting were beaten and mounted his turns. May even rejected him from the starting lineup in favor Rubin JonesAnother newcomer from the northern Texas. From January 27 to the end of the regulatory season, Gayle only twice achieved a double digit scoring in the range of 12 games. Foreigners seemed to be fired.

Because of this, the victory in Michigan 91-79 over the fourth seed of Texas A&M had to be so satisfying for Gayle, which poured in a high and high 26 point season when he may have needed it most. Gayle shot 7-o-14 from the field in total, including 4-for-6 from 3 points, and made all eight of his free throws in what is unquestionable his best effect of 32-Boda with Ohio State on December 30, 2023, in the victory of the extension against West Virginia. Having scored 21 points in the second half of the game on Saturday night, Gayle helped Michigan delete a 10 -point deficit over the last 13 minutes.

Gayle production and starting Center Vlad Goldin, who scored 23 points and scored 12 rebounds, was enough for Wolverines to overcome modest efforts in some of their other stars. Power forward Danny Wolf And the guard point Tre Donaldson In a combination only for 22 points, but the latter turned beautiful, full of traffic schedule with: 59, remaining all that only made the game out of reach.

And now, after two years of futility under former coach Juwan Howard, Wolverines are in the first season of May.

St. John’s becomes icy cold in the second round of Arkansas

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From the middle of the season of the season, by then it has become clear St. John He was responsible for consideration among the best teams in the country, analysts wondered what would happen if the fifth order of Storm Storm really grows his ugly head. In other words, can Rick Pitino’s head coach entered 32 rounds 329. In the percentage of a goal of 3 points in 30.8%-to play in the game when their statistically cold shooting of the perimeter became an extra icy? Can a red storm still find a way to win?

What was nothing more than a thought experiment for a better part of the season was finally seriously examined against Arkansas at 10. Seed on Saturday afternoon, traveling to Sweet 16 in question. St. John’s, who broke out for 14, made a 3-pointer in a comprehensive victory of 83-53 over Over Over the introductory round, suddenly started missing. And miss, and miss and miss. Just one of the 13 attempts of a red storm from the range of 3 points found a goal during the grid of the first half against Razorbacks, which themselves were similar to ineffective outside the arch. That the only player related to the 3-Boda for St. John was a spare guard Lefteris liotopoulos underlined how terrible the situation became. Beginning Kadr Richmond,, Aaron Scott and Rj luis Jr. He tried and failed all six of their shots.

The result was three points for Arkansas, whose coach John Kalipari brought together a list with enough length and athletics to neutralize or at least compensate for the effects that St. John most often enjoyed in the Great East. The Calipari team aligned a red storm with 18 paint points during the opening of the stanza and almost equalized them on the glass (29-25 in favor of St. John). The basics were set because of the potential aggravation of seismic proportions; After all, Razorbacks almost missed the NCAA tournament completely after passing the 19-12 regular season in which they lost multiple sec matches than they won.

And somehow, in some way, in the midst of some mouth of unknown reasons, the performance of St. John from there was only getting worse. The Red Storm missed 11 consecutive goals on the field with 3:40 first half to 6:00 pm the second mark, to which their deficit on the table increased to 11 points. Richmond threw out 6:28 in just 16 minutes of playing, and his last stature line with the same number of points (five) as the offense (five) in a shocking screen. Luis, who was named Big East Player of the Year, spent the 4:56 finals on a bench for reasons that were not immediately clear, although he withstand the terrible effort of 3-for-17.

But it wasn’t like a red storm has no chance, especially in the last few minutes. As the Arkansas players tightened under the pressure-bypassing a semi-war offense for meandering, draining the possessions, long before such a strategy would be generally advisable-Raorbacks settled for even worse and worse hit, there were six of the last 10 from the field. If the Pitino team managed to connect in any of his countless attempts from the range of 3 points down the course, the outcome of the Saturday game would probably be different. But St. John missed seven 3 in the final 6:14, including six bricks only in the last two minutes.

There was too much in vain for a red storm to overcome: Arkansas 75, St. John’s 66.

She singled out the dream season for Pitino and his team.

Michael Cohen covers college football and college basketball for Fox Sports. Follow it on Twitter @Michael_cohen13.

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