1 + 1 + 1 + Arizona = Final Four : Southeast Regional: Wildcats survive youthful mistakes to defeat Providence in overtime.

Arizona was supposed to be a Final Four contender next season, but the Wildcats didn’t want to wait that long.

The impatience of youth worked just fine for Arizona, which became the most unlikely of the Final Four teams by beating Providence, 96-92, in overtime Sunday to win the NCAA Southeast Regional.

“Certainly, this was not expected,” said Coach Lute Olson, whose team began the season with four new starters and has no seniors in the playing rotation. “Everybody kept saying, ‘Next year, they’re going to be pretty good.’ Well, next year got here a little early.”

Fourth-seeded Arizona, which will join No. 1s North Carolina, Kentucky and Minnesota in the Final Four, showed its inexperience down the stretch against Providence, squandering a seven-point lead in the final 1:15 of regulation with several ill-advised shots.

“Tomorrow, we’re going to start taking a time management course in addition to all the other ones,” said Olson, whose team missed two shots in the final minute when their coach had told them to run down the clock. “We made some horrible decisions.”

The Wildcats survived a last-second shot that would have won the game for Providence, then wore the Friars down in overtime as Miles Simon equaled his career high with 30 points.

“This is the most tired I’ve ever been after a game,” Simon said. “Providence caused a lot of that by pushing and pushing toward the end. But we knew the last five minutes had to be ours.”

Arizona will meet North Carolina in the national semifinals next Saturday in Indianapolis, trying to advance to the championship game for the first time in school history. The teams met in their season opener, with Arizona beating the Tar Heels, 83-72, in the Hall of Fame Tipoff Classic.

“I’ll guarantee you one thing: This team is not going to be satisfied just to be there,” Olson said.

Arizona (23-9), despite Final Four appearances in 1988 and ‘94, was a program haunted by first-round losses to East Tennessee State, Santa Clara and Miami of Ohio in the previous five seasons. But those were different teams.

These Wildcats pulled off the biggest upset of the tournament Friday night, beating top-ranked Kansas in the regional semifinals. Then Arizona pulled itself together after Providence made a remarkable comeback.

The 10th-seeded Friars (24-12), trying to become the lowest-seeded team to reach the Final Four since 11th-seeded LSU in 1986, tied the game, 85-85, when Jamel Thomas hit a three-pointer with 15.3 seconds remaining.

Providence had a chance to win after stealing the ball at midcourt. But Corey Wright’s three-pointer was off target and the game went to overtime, where the Friars finally ran out of steam.

“Clearly, it was an uphill battle the whole game,” said Providence Coach Pete Gillen. “The kids kept scratching and clawing and with 3.9 seconds left, we had a chance to steal the game.”

Simon made four of six beyond the three-point arc and put the Wildcats ahead to stay on a basket with 2:53 left in the extra period.

Providence lost its best player, Austin Croshere, midway through the second half. He fouled out after scoring a tournament-low 12 points.

“We lost this ballgame, but that doesn’t take away from how we came through in the NCAAs,” Croshere said. “The adversity we came through all season helped us get to this point.”

Arizona seemed to be in control when Croshere fouled out and two of his teammates received technical fouls for arguing calls. The Wildcats took advantage, scoring six points on one possession and five on another to build a 12-point lead.

The Friars still trailed, 82-72, with 3 1/2 minutes to go and seemed to be finished. But with Croshere cheering them on from the bench, Providence came back.

It began after Mike Bibby hit two free throws to give Arizona an 85-78 lead with 1:15 left.

God Shammgod, who equaled Thomas with a team-high 23 points, made a free throw with 1:05 to go, missed the second and Derrick Brown got the rebound. He was fouled and hit two free throws to make it 85-81 with 1:02 left.

Arizona broke the press and drove up court, but Michael Dickerson missed a wide-open eight-footer when Olson wanted him to run more clock. Ruben Garces hit a free throw at the other end for Providence after grabbing one of his 19 rebounds, cutting the deficit to 85-82 with 47.1 seconds to go.

Once again, the Friars came up with a defensive stop. Simon rushed a shot and it was blocked by Garces, sending Providence the other way. Thomas got open in the corner and hit a three-pointer to tie the game.

But Thomas made only nine of 29 shots overall and the Friars couldn’t recover after Brown fouled out in overtime. Jason Terry clinched the victory with a pull-up jumper in the lane to give Arizona a 94-90 lead with 1:03 left.

When the horn sounded, Terry clung to the rim while Simon broke a table on press row jumping into the crowd to celebrate with his family.