12 things I saw on Day 2 of the 2024 NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament

SAN ANTONIO – The University of Texas at San Antonio’s new men’s basketball coach finally acknowledged his new job on social media earlier this week.

Austin Claunch changed his Twitter bio to reflect his new gig with the hashtag #BirdsUp.

Before he starts anew in San Antonio, Claunch will continue in his assistant coaching role with the Alabama Crimson Tide.

One Crimson Tide player, forward Nick Pringle, expressed his joy for Claunch with a warning to the rest of the tournament field.

“Only one way to send you off,” Pringle tweeted. “Let’s handle business.”

Alabama handled its business against the College of Charleston, 109-96, on Friday night.

While UTSA’s new head coach will spend the rest of the weekend in Spokane, Washington, here are 12 other noteworthy things from Day 2 of the 2024 NCAA Tournament.

Thing 1: The day after Thursday

Kentucky dropping its first-round game to Oakland Thursday night was fun to watch unfold on television but, for many, was a horror to watch their bracket implode in real-time.

The Associated Press reported Friday morning that 95% of people who filled out brackets through ESPN’s Tournament Challenge chose the Wildcats to take down the Golden Grizzlies. Making matters worse, 74.21% of ESPN’s brackets had UK in the Sweet 16 and nearly 29 percent of brackets (28.84%) had Kentucky in the Final Four.

Imagine knowing someone who not only had Kentucky making the Elite Eight in their bracket but also had Florida Atlantic in the Elite Eight and McNeese State in the Final Four. As it turns out, you do know someone with that bracket because you know me.

Former Texas Longhorns running back Bijan Robinson was one of the few geniuses to emerge from Day 1 unscathed. Robinson correctly predicted such upsets as Oakland’s win, NC State’s upset of Texas Tech and Oregon’s dominance of South Carolina.

Robinson withstood Northwestern’s win over Florida Atlantic on Friday afternoon, but his bracket finally got one wrong just hours later.

Second-seeded Marquette took down 15th-seeded Western Kentucky, which means Robinson’s bracket becomes just as meaningless as the rest of ours.

Thing 2: With Love, Langston

Baylor coach Scott Drew said Wednesday that his team would not have Steele High School alum Langston Love available through the first weekend of the NCAA Tournament.

Love, who averages 11 points per game this season, has dealt with an inordinate amount of injuries in his short college career.

After graduating from Steele in 2021, Love suffered a torn ACL injury during an Oct. 2021 scrimmage at Baylor, delaying his freshman season before it got off the ground. Late last season, Love began wearing protective eyewear as he dealt with an eye injury.

This season, a series of ankle injuries have sidelined Love for much of February and March, but they haven’t swayed his spirit.

“I just feel like God has a plan for me and that with heavy trials you always come out better on the other side,” Love told the Baylor Lariat, the university’s student-run newspaper, earlier this week. “So I’ve been gradually getting better with my body every year, so hopefully next year I go to no injuries and then keep that going for the rest of my career.”

The Bears are missing Love’s 48% shooting from three-point range, among other things, but were able to make do in their first-round matchup against Colgate.

Baylor made 16 of 30 three-point attempts (53.3%) on Friday afternoon in the Bears’ 92-67 win over the Raiders.

Thing 3: What was Johnell Davis thinking?

Florida Atlantic was in a similar place as it was when it made a magical run to the Final Four in 2023, the eight-nine game in the first round.

The only difference is that the Owls are the No. 8 seed this year. They were a No. 9 seed last year.

FAU’s key players in 2022-23 all returned to Boca Raton to make a run at a national championship in 2024. Head coach Dusty May put together a difficult nonconference schedule to reflect his confidence in his players. The early season schedule featured games against College of Charleston, Texas A&M, Illinois and Arizona.

Guard Johnell Davis was arguably the biggest name to return to FAU. He completely took over in the Owls’ double-overtime victory against No. 4 Arizona on Dec. 23, 2023, with 35 points and nine rebounds.

Moments after the eighth-seeded Northwestern Wildcats tied the game at 58 on Friday, Davis did the opposite of taking over the game.

“Why would he (Davis) stumble?” CBS college basketball analyst Bill Raftery said when regulation ended. “Blow by and get to the rim! You’re going to get a good shot or find somebody!”

It really takes something egregious for something to draw Raftery’s ire on the air and this was that.

Thing 4: ‘Over’ is just getting started

Something about overtime turns an unassuming Northwestern team into a full-grown monster.

The Wildcats have played a total of four overtime games this season. They’re 2-2 in OT games, but those two wins came against top-10-ranked Big Ten opponents. Purdue was undefeated and ranked No. 1 in the country when the ‘Cats picked them off back on Dec. 1, 2023. Illinois was ranked No. 10 in the nation when the Fighting Illini dropped an overtime game to their in-state rival on Jan. 24.

Despite Florida Atlantic’s 3-1 own overtime record this season, it was Northwestern who played a nearly flawless overtime period Friday in Brooklyn, New York. The Wildcats went a perfect 5-for-5 from the floor, including a three-pointer that was improv basketball at its finest.

Northwestern’s 19 points in the five-minute overtime equaled Northwestern’s 19 points…in the entire 20-minute first half.

Totally normal sport.

Thing 5: Finishing what he started

Friday’s late afternoon window wasn’t the easiest to keep tabs on.

As Yale was on its way to stunning Auburn around 6 p.m. San Antonio time, the Colorado Buffaloes and Florida Gators were locked in their tight affair that reached into the triple digits at the same dang time.

The Buffs needed a bucket to draw even with the Gators before halftime. The man who provided the jumper to tie the game at 45 was Colorado guard K.J. Simpson.

The Buffaloes created enough space between themselves and the Gators in the second half before Walter Clayton Jr. pulled a one-man comeback, scoring Florida’s last 16 points, including a clinically insane three-pointer, to tie the game at 100.

The Buffs had 6.1 seconds to draw up a play and get a good shot in the air before the end of regulation. The man who provided a game-winning shot attempt was, again, Colorado guard K.J. Simpson.

Edgar Allen Poe’s got nothing on March.

Thing 6: Yale yeah

Charles Barkley is one of America’s great success stories.

He grew up in Leeds, Alabama, blossomed into a 6-foot-6 scoring and rebounding menace and became the blueprint of what an opinionated former player sounds like.

Barkley didn’t mince words when he was asked his thoughts about his alma mater Auburn facing off against Ivy League champion Yale.

“We’re not gonna lose to the smart kids. I’ll tell you that,” Barkley said Thursday night.

The Tigers had the athletes and the length to get it done. Through one half, they were.

The second half was a much different story. Yale erased the deficit, briefly took the lead with 15:37 to play, lost the lead and then made a late push.

The Bulldogs took a one-point lead with over two minutes to go, but the Tigers were snakebitten.

Auburn sent three capable free-throw shooters to the line in the final minute — guards Denver Jones (87.8%), K.D. Johnson (78%) and Tre Donaldson (82.9%) — and they all missed free throws.

In addition to free throws, the Tigers couldn’t make much of anything when they needed it most. On its last possession, Auburn was blocked twice and never had a serious look to tie or win the game.

“Never thought a Bulldog would beat a Tiger, but they did,” Barkley said after the game. “Congratulations to Yale. Man, it’s gonna be a long trip from Spokane, Washington back to the Plains.”

Yale advances to the Round of 32 for the first time since the Bulldogs beat Baylor in the first round eight years ago.

Meanwhile, Barkley had some fun during TBS’ postgame studio coverage.

“Tom Izzo, I need you desperately. Coach Izzo, please. Bring me home tomorrow,” Charles Barkley said while pretending to be on the phone with the Michigan State coach.

At least I think he was joking.

Thing 7: Shaka, not stirred

The world was first introduced to Shaka Smart when he was the fresh-faced 33-year-old coach of the Virginia Commonwealth Rams.

In 2011, VCU earned a bid to the NCAA Tournament and the newly created First Four. Smart guided his Rams from the First Four to the Final Four in Houston where they lost in the National Semifinal to Butler.

Back then, he looked a little something like this.

2011 was a long time ago. Smart left VCU in 2015 for a middling six seasons at Texas that ended with zero NCAA Tournament wins in Austin.

He took the head coaching job at Marquette two years ago. On Friday, Smart earned his first NCAA Tournament win since that magical VCU run in 2011.

Now, Smart looks a little something like this.

He looks happier, doesn’t he?

Thing 8: Addition & multiplication

Texas A&M ended its month of February with a respectable two-point loss to South Carolina, but the Aggies were sick and tired of stockpiling respectable losses.

They were 15-13 overall, 6-9 in Southeastern Conference play and in the throes of a five-game losing streak. Hope for an NCAA Tournament at-large bid was slim. They needed to get on a winning streak.

The calendar turned to March and, as luck would have it, the Aggies would get their winning streak, beating Georgia, Mississippi State and Ole Miss twice. The capper on the streak was a win over ninth-ranked Kentucky at the SEC Tournament, which all but cemented an unlikely at-large bid to the NCAAs.

This year’s Aggies aren’t exactly known for their scoring, but they ran into a Nebraska club not too keen on playing defense. The result: Texas A&M became the Kevin Durant-era Golden State Warriors.

Guards Wade Taylor IV and Tyrece Radford combining for 45 points is no surprise, but the emergence of one of the Aggie sophomores was not expected.

Manny Obaseki had a forgettable first nine minutes, 58 seconds of the game, going 0-for-2 from the floor, missing a free throw and committing a turnover to start the evening.

Over the final 10:02 of the first half, Obaseki scored 19 points and vaulted the Aggies to a 58-point half, their highest-scoring half of the season.

The Cornhuskers never got themselves back in the game.

Thing 9: Awwwwwkward

Nebraska was proud to have one of its own leading the athletic department.

Trev Alberts is a Husker vestige to its former football glory under coach Tom Osborne. He played for Nebraska in a national championship game in the early 1990s and returned to Lincoln as the university’s athletic director in 2021.

Ten days ago, Alberts did the seemingly unthinkable when he left to leave his alma mater for the athletic director job at Texas A&M.

While Nebraska fans have been steaming about one of their own leaving Lincoln, the NCAA Men’s and Women’s Basketball Selection Committees decided to do something incredible: Have Texas A&M and Nebraska face off in the first round of *both* tournaments.

The Aggie men took care of business on the men’s side, but the Cornhusker women drew even with A&M in their first-round victory on Friday.

March Madness has the unique ability to bring people together. Sometimes, March Madness also brings people you never want to see again together.

Thing 10: A long night for Longwood

Longwood’s head coach, Griff Aldrich, was set to make a kind of a homecoming Friday night.

Before he became a coach, Aldrich was an attorney at a law firm in Houston. He left the firm to chase his dream of being a college basketball coach. Standing in the Lancers’ way was the top-seeded Houston Cougars.

It was a nice, full-circle moment that could warm your heart.

What the Cougars did to the Lancers, however, was anything but nice.

Houston played with the defensive intensity worthy of a team with the Final Four on its mind. The Cougars scored 25 points off 18 Lancer turnovers. Houston led by 27 points at the half and won the game by 40.

Next up for the Cougars is Texas A&M, their friends from the old Southwest Conference.

Houston held off A&M in a neutral-site game on Dec. 16, 2023, at Toyota Center in Houston.

Thing 11: Put up your Dukes

Four months ago, James Madison kicked off the college basketball season with a bang.

The Dukes walked into the noisy and contentious Breslin Center and upset the Michigan State Spartans 79-76 in overtime on Nov. 6. The Spartans were the preseason No. 4 team in the country.

Thirty more wins, a Sun Belt Conference regular-season championship and a Sun Belt Conference tournament championship later, the Dukes were awarded a No. 12 seed on Selection Sunday.

They were also given a chance to pick off another Big Ten team in the first round: the Wisconsin Badgers.

Four Dukes reached double-figure scoring to help them down Wisconsin.

Now, the Dukes face the funniest opponent possible — the Duke Blue Devils — on Sunday.

Thing 12: Blood ‘Boil’-ing

One year ago, Purdue became the poster child for top-seeded futility.

The Boilermakers, a No. 1 seed in the 2023 NCAA Tournament, embarrassed themselves in a 63-58 loss to 16th-seeded Farleigh Dickinson. It was the worst way to end the season for All-American center Zach Edey, who had hopes of cutting down the nets in Houston.

This time around, the 21-year-old wanted to have the last word. Edey scored 30 points and grabbed 21 rebounds in the Boilermakers’ 78-50 win over 16th-seeded Grambling State on Friday.

“It’s what we’re supposed to do,” Edey told TNT Sports reporter Andy Katz. “I don’t think anybody on this team wants any praise. Nobody wants nothing. It’s what we’re supposed to do. We’re focused on the next game now.”

A focused Edey and a focused Boilermaker team would be two things no opponent in their region would want to go up against.

Congrats, Utah State. You’re up next.