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COLLEGE BASKETBALL / POSTSEASON TOURNAMENTS : NCAA MIDWEST REGIONAL : Connecticut Cuts Down O’Neal and LSU

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From Associated Press

Before Thursday night’s game, Louisiana State center Shaquille O’Neal said that if he were coaching Connecticut, “I would put four men on Shaquille O’Neal.”

The Huskies took O’Neal’s advice, then shut him down until the game was out of reach during a 79-62 victory in the first round of the Midwest Regional.

Connecticut (19-10) will play Xavier in Saturday’s second round.

“Well, they did put three or four guys on me,” said O’Neal, who missed eight of his first 13 shots and scored 14 of his 27 points after Connecticut had built a 22-point lead. “Every time the ball came inside, they collapsed on me.”

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O’Neal made 11 of 22 shots, nine of them dunks. But the rest of the Tigers shot 24%, making 13 of 53 shots.

“We’ve had a major weakness all year long . . . and you don’t have to get an academic scholarship to figure it out. We’ve been a horrendous perimeter team,” LSU Coach Dale Brown said. “That’s not a big secret. Why more people didn’t play us this way is beyond my imagination.”

O’Neal looked rusty in his first game since Feb. 27, when he was sidelined by a hairline fracture in his left leg. The 7-foot-1 sophomore All-American was asked if Thursday’s game would be his last at LSU.

“Right now, I’m not thinking about the NBA at all. I don’t know,” he said. “It could be, it could not be.”

It wasn’t the last game for Connecticut, which got 25 points from Chris Smith and used a 16-4 run at the end of the first half and a 15-4 spurt at the start of the second to make it a rout.

It was the third consecutive loss for LSU (20-10), which failed to advance past the second round of the NCAA tournament for the fifth consecutive year.

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LSU went inside to O’Neal regularly, and occasionally the results were spectacular. One of his dunks was an alley-oop one-hander. But more often than not, Connecticut’s Rod Sellers and Scott Burrell were there to knock away passes and throw O’Neal off his game.

“It was very important to play good defense on him early and try to get him out of his game,” Sellers said.

Iowa 76, No. 17 East Tennessee State 73--The Hawkeyes hounded 5-7 guard Keith Jennings wherever he went, forcing the Buccaneers’ star into a sub-par shooting performance.

Jennings, who averages 20 points a game, had 11 against Iowa, making four of 13 shots.

Iowa (21-10) got 18 points from Acie Earl and two free throws each from Troy Skinner and James Moses in the final 16 seconds to hold off the Buccaneers.

Iowa will face Duke in Saturday’s second round.

Jennings was trying to become the first player in NCAA history to shoot 60% overall and 60% from the three-point line for a season. He fell short in both categories after making only three of eight three-point shots and missing four of his six shots in the first half.

Moses and Skinner added 14 points each for Iowa, which trailed by 10 in the first half. Rodney English led East Tennessee State (28-5) with 25 points.

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Xavier 89, No. 11 Nebraska 84--Jamie Gladden scored 20 points and the 14th-seeded Musketeers made five free throws in the final 47 seconds to upset the third-seeded Cornhuskers.

Jamal Walker added 18 points, Michael Davenport 17 and Brian Grant 15 for Xavier (22-9) which reached the Final 16 a year ago.

Rich King scored 25 points for Nebraska (26-8).

No. 6 Duke 102, Northeast Louisiana 73--Duke center Christian Laettner scored 22 points, including eight during a decisive 23-6 second-half run, as the Blue Devils took the first step toward a fourth consecutive Final Four appearance.

Thomas Hill added 18 points for the Blue Devils (27-7), who got solid performances off the bench from Bill McCaffrey (17 points) and Brian Davis (15 points, nine rebounds).

“Our depth wore them down,” Duke Coach Mike Krzyzewski said.

Anthony Jones scored 24 points, Carlos Fuchess 19 and Casey Jones 14 for Northeast Louisiana (25-8), which lost for the first time in 17 games.

“We certainly didn’t play as well as we were capable,” Northeast Louisiana Coach Mike Vining said. “But I’m smart enough to know Duke had something to do with that. We have great 6-3 athletes, they have great 6-6 athletes.”

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