Knight Can Carry Stanford Only So Far

On his way to scoring 27 points against No. 1-seeded Massachusetts in the East Regional Saturday, Stanford guard Brevin Knight kept running into All-America center Marcus Camby.

After one play in which Knight had his shot blocked and collided with Camby, the two players exchanged smiles of mutual recognition.

“We know each other,” Knight said after Massachusetts defeated Stanford, 79-72, in the second-round NCAA tournament game. “I just said to him ‘I’m going to be here all afternoon.’

“He’s a shot blocker and I’m a penetrator. Sometimes he blocks and sometimes I finish.”

More often than not, Knight finished. His scoring and desire kept the No. 9-seeded Cardinal in the game until the final seconds.

“Brevin Knight was unbelievable. We had no answers,” Massachusetts Coach John Calipari said. “[He] just has too much. He goes through you and under you. We tried three different ways of playing him and none of them worked.”

With 13:24 left and Stanford losing 55-44, Knight brought his team back, scoring 13 points in a 22-15 run that closed the deficit to 70-66 with 3:50 left. In that span, he made a three-pointer shot and a 17-footer, a one-handed shot from the lane, a twisting floater off a baseline drive and four of five free throws.

With 15 seconds remaining and Stanford behind, 77-74, it was freshman Peter Sauer--not Knight or long-range specialist Dion Cross--who took a three-point shot. Sauer, who had made only seven three-point shots all season, missed.

“You can look at it like ‘It’s a freshman,’ ” Stanford Coach Mike Montgomery said of Sauer’s miss. “I’d like Dion to shoot my threes if I have a choice. We got a clean look at the basket and Pete at that point was five of six from the floor. Hey, it was the shot that they were going to give up.”

In the end, Knight could not do it all for Stanford (20-9) as he missed a pair of three-point shots as time ran out. He finished with eight-of-17 shooting from the field and made 10 of 13 free throws.

Camby, who played 29 minutes because of foul trouble, finished with 20 points, eight rebounds and seven blocked shots.

Massachusetts (32-1), which beat Stanford by 22 points in the tournament’s second round last year, plays Arkansas (20-12) in the round of 16 Thursday in Atlanta.

Arkansas 65, Marquette 56--The full-court pressure of the No. 12-seeded Razorbacks proved too much for the No. 4-seeded Golden Eagles (23-8), which also hurt themselves with a season-low 27% shooting.

“The defensive pressure has been the key to this basketball team,” said Arkansas Coach Nolan Richardson. “It’s very difficult for teams to adjust to what we do in a one-game situation. That caused a lot of problems for Marquette.”

Arkansas used this approach to win the national championship in 1994 and be a runner-up to UCLA last year, and this team, which has four freshmen starters, seems equally adept with it. The Razorbacks forced 17 turnovers and seemed particularly wearing in the second half on Marquette, which missed 23 of 29 shots.

Arkansas had four double-figure scorers, with forward Derek Hood getting 13 rebounds to go with his 11 points.

Guard Aaron Hutchins had 20 points for Marquette.