CHICAGO (AP) — Yaxel Lendeborg made a tiebreaking 3-pointer with 0.4 seconds remaining, and No. 3 Michigan beat Nick Boyd and No. 23 Wisconsin 68-65 to advance to the Big Ten Tournament championship. Aday Mara scored 16 points and Elliot Cadeau had 15 as top-seeded Michigan avenged its only conference loss from the regular season, a 91-88 setback against Wisconsin on Jan. 10. Mara also grabbed eight rebounds and blocked five shots. Lendeborg got off to another slow start after he had just six points in Friday’s quarterfinal victory over Ohio State. But the Big Ten player of the year began to assert himself right before halftime, and he connected on the biggest shot of the game.
CHICAGO (AP) — Oscar Cluff had 17 points and 14 rebounds, and No. 18 Purdue beat short-handed UCLA 73-66 to advance to the Big Ten championship game. Cluff scored eight points as Purdue outscored UCLA 11-4 over the final 3:41. Fletcher Loyer scored 14. Braden Smith contributed nine more assists, giving him 1,064 in his career. He needs 13 to break Bobby Hurley’s NCAA record of 1,076 for Duke from 1989-93. Trey Kaufman-Ren added 12 points and 10 rebounds, helping Purdue advance to the conference final for the first time since winning the tournament in Chicago in 2023. The Boilermakers will meet No. 3 Michigan. The Wolverines, seeking a championship repeat, beat No. 23 Wisconsin 68-65 when Yaxel Lendeborg made a tiebreaking 3-pointer with 0.4 seconds remaining.
UNDATED (AP) — Southeastern Conference commissioner Greg Sankey called the NCAA language covering tampering rules “archaic,” but stopped short of urging the oversight body to halt tampering investigations, the way the Big Ten did earlier this week. Speaking to reporters at the SEC basketball tournament, the commissioner said the new landscape in college sports, which includes name-image-likeness payments to players, shifting and liberal transfer rules and the increased influence of agents, calls for the language surrounding the rules to be changed.
CHICAGO (AP) — Yaxel Lendeborg yelled and pumped his right arm in celebration before he was mobbed by the rest of his Michigan teammates. The 6-foot-9 forward turned a halftime message from coach Dusty May into one of his best moments in a huge season. Lendeborg made a tiebreaking 3-pointer with 0.4 seconds remaining, sending No. 3 Michigan to a 68-65 victory over No. 23 Wisconsin in the semifinals of the Big Ten Tournament. Lendeborg says May encouraged him to be more aggressive in the second half. He scored nine of his 12 points after the break.
FAYATTEVILLE, Ark. (AP) — Tyrice Taylor and Rivaldo Marshall finished 1-2 in the 800 meters to help Arkansas run away with the men’s team title, while Georgia freshman Adaejah Hodge won the 200 meters in a facility-record 22.22 seconds as the Bulldogs won the women’s team crown at the NCAA Indoor Track Championships. Arkansas clinched it’s title first since 2013 and finished with 73.5 points, 7.5 more than Oregon (40 points) — which also finished second on the women’s side — and third-place Florida (26) combined. Georgia, last year’s runner-up, finished with 53 points to win its first indoor championship since 2018. The Ducks had 44 points and Illinois was third with 42 points. Georgia coach Caryl Smith Gilbert also led Bulldogs women to 2025 outdoor title.
CHICAGO (AP) — UCLA star forward Tyler Bilodeau will likely miss at least one game because of a right leg injury he suffered in the Bruins’ 88-84 win over No. 8 Michigan State in the Big Ten Tournament quarterfinals. Coach Mick Cronin all but ruled Bilodeau out for the semifinal game against No. 18 Purdue on Saturday, saying it would take “literally a miracle for him to play.” Cronin was hopeful that Bilodeau has “some sort of sprain” rather than a more serious injury and said he was to go for more imaging. But exactly how long he will be out was unclear.
PITTSBURGH (AP) — The NCAA is warning schools about potential travel headaches ahead of the men's and women's basketball tournaments. A lack of charter plane availability, the partial government shutdown and conflict in the Middle East could all have a ripple effect on the 68 team men's and women's fields. It is hardly the first time it has been an issue. Atlantic 10 commissioner Bernadette McGlade says she faced the same concerns when she was the director of the women's tournament years ago. The NCAA is trying to take a “business as usual” approach. McGlade says the benefit of being in the tournament far outweighs any travel snags that might pop up.
