After 25-year drought, is this finally the year Arizona gets over the hump and makes Final Four again?
The Wildcats look complete, and it's fair to wonder when they'll have a better shot at the NCAA tournament's final weekend.
When Arizona celebrated the 25th anniversary of its most recent Final Four team at halftime of a home game last month, Richard Jefferson addressed the crowd with a videotaped message that aired on the McKale Center jumbotron. Jefferson apologized for not being able to attend the ceremony in person, spoke glowingly of the bond his 2001 Arizona team had and then addressed the program’s inability to get back to the Final Four for the past quarter century. “I believe for the first time that we have a team that will return,” Jefferson said.
Surely, this has to be the Arizona team that ends that drought. Surely, this has to be the Arizona team that halts the program’s tortured 25-year run of near misses and wasted opportunities. Anything else would be a colossal disappointment for the Wildcats after beating 12 ranked opponents before Selection Sunday, sweeping the Big 12 regular season and tournament titles and laying waste to their first three NCAA tournament opponents by an average margin of more than 22 points.
A 109-88 demolition of fourth-seeded Arkansas in the NCAA tournament’s Sweet 16 on Thursday night further exemplified Arizona’s dominance. The Wildcats exposed a Razorbacks team that had previously been able to pile up enough points to make up for its defensive shortcomings. Arizona shot 63.
8% from the field against Arkansas, the highest by any team in the second week of the NCAA tournament since 2005, per former ESPN researcher Jared Berson . Six Wildcats scored 14 or more points, the first time that’s ever happened in an NCAA tournament game, according to Berson. Arizona's Koa Peat celebrates after beating the Arkansas Razorbacks during the Sweet 16 in the 2026 NCAA tournament.
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