Long bombs help the Hoyas fend off Villanova comeback

Georgetown made 17
3-point goals to tie a Big East tournament record.

ASSOCIATED PRESS

NEW YORK — Jessie Sapp scored 23 points and No. 9 Georgetown tied a Big East tournament record with 17 3-pointers, fending off a second-half comeback to beat Villanova 82-63 on Thursday in the second round.

Jonathan Wallace hit five 3s and had 19 of his 20 points in the first half for the defending champion Hoyas (26-4), who advanced to play fifth-seeded West Virginia in the semifinals on Friday.

DeJuan Summers added 19 points for Georgetown, winners of five straight. All-Big East center Roy Hibbert, who was 0-for-2 from the field and had no points and just four rebounds before fouling out with 5:09 left.

West Virginia 78,
No. 15 Connecticut 72

NEW YORK — Joe Alexander continued his scoring streak with a career-high 34 points and West Virginia earned its second appearance in the Big East semifinals.

Alexander was 12-for-22 from the field and 10-for-12 from the free throw line as West Virginia led the entire second half. The Mountaineers’ biggest lead was 13 points, the last time at 61-48 with 9:18 left, and they held off a run that had the Huskies as close as 70-65 on a driving layup by A.J. Price with 2:02 to play.

Atlantic 10

No. 10 Xavier 74,
Dayton 65

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. — Josh Duncan scored 16 points and Xavier limited Dayton to five baskets in the final 12 minutes.

C.J. Anderson added 15 points, Stanley Burrell had 13, Drew Lavender 12 and Derrick Brown 11 as the top-seeded Musketeers (27-5) beat Dayton (21-10) for the third time this season.

Mountain West

No. 24 BYU 89,
Colorado State 62

LAS VEGAS — Lee Cummard, the conference co-player of the year, scored 18 points to lead five players in double figures as BYU piled up the points to advance to the Mountain West title game.

Sam Burgess had 13 points, Jonathan Tavernari and Chris Collinsworth each added 12 and Trent Plaisted 11 for the top-seeded Cougars (26-6), who shot 65 percent from the field.

Pac-10

No. 3 UCLA 88,
California 66

LOS ANGELES — UCLA buried California under a barrage of 3-pointers to start the second half and advanced to the Pac-10 semifinals.

Darren Collison scored 19 points, Josh Shipp 18, and freshman Kevin Love had nine of his 11 in the second half after early foul trouble. UCLA (29-3) had its best 3-point shooting game of the season, hitting 14-of-25.

The top-seeded Bruins won their eighth in a row and advanced to a matchup against Southern California. The rivals split in the regular season, with each winning on the other’s floor.

Southeastern Conference

No. 18 Vanderbilt 93,
Auburn 82

ATLANTA — A.J. Ogilvy scored a career-best 27 points and Shan Foster added 26 after being named the top player on the coaches’ All-SEC team earlier in the week, leading Vanderbilt in the opening round.

The Commodores (26-6) shot 67 percent (33 of 49) from the field, falling just short of the conference tournament record. They advanced to face Arkansas in the quarterfinals.

Conference USA

Memphis 75,
Tulane 56

MEMPHIS, Tenn. — Chris Douglas-Roberts scored 17 points, and No. 2 Memphis advanced to the semifinals of the C-USA tournament.

Memphis (31-1), the two-time defending tournament champ, will play either Southern Mississippi or No. 4 seed UCF, who played later Thursday night.

Coach John Calipari and the Tigers are trying to lock down a No. 1 seed in the NCAA tournament for the second time in three seasons.