Arizona buzzsaw left Arkansas HC John Calipari in awe after Sweet 16 beatdown
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Thursday night’s Sweet 16 clash in the West region between No. 1 seed Arizona and No. 4 seed Arkansas was highly-anticipated, as it pitted one of the best teams in the country against one of the best players in Arkansas star Darius Acuff Jr. However, the Wildcats proved once again that basketball is a team sport, containing Acuff and routing the Razorbacks 109-88 to advance to the Elite Eight.
Arizona improves to 35-2 on the season with this win and is the current favorite to win the national championship, and it showed why in this game. After it finished, Arkansas head coach John Calipariwas in awe of the buzzsaw that Tommy Lloyd has built in Tucson.
“Arizona is really good. Wow,” Calipari said bluntly, via Michelle Gardner of the Arizona Republic.
The Wildcats don’t have many, if any, holes on their roster, and they showed why on Thursday night. Arizona became the first team in the history of the NCAA Tournament to have six different players score 14 or more points in a game, and it did it on ridiculous shooting efficiency. For the game, Arizona shot 64% from the field and made five of its eight attempts from 3-point range.
On the other side of the ball, Arkansas’ lack of size was exposed by Arizona’s monster front line. Acuff still got to 28 points on the night, but he shot just 8-for-19 from the field and struggled to get to his spots a little bit more than he usually does. Meleek Thomas, the Razorbacks’ other top scorer, managed just 17 points on 5-for-11.
This is still a productive postseason run for Calipari and company, as Arkansas rolled through the SEC Tournament to take home the conference crown before entering the NCAA Tournament and reaching the Sweet 16. However, this is a bittersweet exit after the Razorbacks were bounced from March Madness at the same stage last season by Texas Tech.
With two Sweet 16 exits in two years as the Arkansas head coach, Calipari will be focused on getting over that hurdle in 2027.
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