Wisconsin Milwaukee Gives Alabama Some Bad News

Wisconsin Milwaukee’s players didn’t madly chase each other around the floor or do anything extraordinary to celebrate the biggest win in school history.

The Panthers were above all that. This was business as usual.

“We expected this,” forward Joah Tucker said. “It wasn’t a big surprise for us.”

Wisconsin Milwaukee, whose players were briefly barred from practicing Wednesday when they couldn’t produce their student IDs, pulled off the first stunner of the NCAA tournament, beating Alabama, 83-73, on Thursday in a first-round game of the Chicago Regional at Cleveland.

Now everyone knows the Panthers.

Tucker and Ed McCants scored 21 points apiece as Milwaukee (25-5) won its first NCAA tournament game in its second try. Two years ago, the 12th-seeded Panthers nearly beat Notre Dame, losing, 70-69.

The Horizon League champions finished the job this time, outplaying one of the Southeastern Conference’s top programs and continuing a trend of No. 12s beating No. 5s in March. That first-round matchup has produced an upset in 16 of the last 17 tournaments, the only exception being in 2000.

Kennedy Winston had 20 points and Ronald Steele 16 for the Crimson Tide (24-8), which had hoped to have another run like a year ago when it reached the round of eight.

Milwaukee, which has won 10 in a row and 18 of 19, will play fourth-seeded Boston College on Saturday.

Alabama Birmingham 82, Louisiana State 68 -- Marvett McDonald had 21 points and made five three-pointers, and the 11th-seeded Blazers used their stingy defense to upset LSU at Boise, Idaho.

The Blazers (22-10) reached the round of 16 last year after beating Washington and top-seeded Kentucky, and they seem to have that same kind of confidence after taking out the Chicago Regional’s sixth-seeded team.

LSU (20-10) got into the tournament with an eight-game winning streak and a one-point overtime loss to Kentucky in the SEC title game.

The Blazers’ attacking defense gave the Tigers fits from the start.

Using a seemingly endless bench -- all 12 players played in the first half -- the Blazers pressed the length of the floor, trapped in halfcourt sets, hounded LSU into mistakes and disrupted the flow of its offense. The Tigers had 21 turnovers -- 12 in the first half -- that led to 20 points, and had trouble controlling the ball even when the Blazers backed off, dribbling the ball off their feet out of bounds several times.

Boston College 85, Pennsylvania 65 -- The Eagles shook off their self-doubts and got back to dominating, rolling past Penn at Cleveland.

The Eagles (25-4) opened the season with 20 wins, then closed with a 4-4 fade that included a first-game loss to West Virginia in the Big East tournament. Coach Al Skinner used the unexpected time off to fix a few things.

Boston College’s defense tightened, holding the Quakers (20-9) to 33% shooting in the decisive first half, when the Eagles led by as many as 22. The only glaring flaw was the Eagles’ 19 turnovers, which allowed the Quakers to close in.

Nevada 61, Texas 57 -- The Wolf Pack made an improbable comeback in the final two minutes at Indianapolis, scoring the final eight points of the game to win.

Nevada (25-6) played with confidence, matching Texas shove for shove as it tied last season’s victory total.

Kevinn Pinkney scored 15 points, and the Wolf Pack survived a dreadful night by Western Athletic Conference player of the year Nick Fazekas, who finished with 10 points while shooting three for 14.

Texas center Jason Klotz and backup guard Kenny Taylor nearly rallied the Longhorns in the second half. They combined for 26 of 31 points in the last 20 minutes and had Texas in position to win with a 57-53 lead and 2:24 to go.

But Texas (20-11), one of five teams that had been to the round of 16 each of the last three years, couldn’t close it out against the scrappy bunch from Reno.

Illinois 67, Fairleigh Dickinson 55 -- The Knights made Illinois work for the victory at Indianapolis.

The Illini watched the Knights come from seven points down to take a brief lead in the first half, but they started the second half with a 14-2 run.

Dee Brown scored 19 points to lead top-seeded Illinois (33-1).

The Knights (20-13) had been promising all week they would play hard and compete, and they were true to their word.

Fairleigh Dickinson outscored Illinois, 20-10, inside and outrebounded the Illini, 42-30.