NCAA Basketball: Ranking the Sweet 16 teams in 2022 NCAA Tournament
By Joey Loose
2. Arizona (#1 seed)
Twelve months ago, Arizona was firing Sean Miller and ready to begin a new era for their basketball program. Now, first-year head coach Tommy Lloyd has the Wildcats looking like a national championship favorite. Arizona won the Pac-12 regular-season and tournament titles, lost just three games all season, and has taken care of business in not only building a powerful roster but notching some impressive victories too.
There wasn’t too much drama in an 87-70 opening-round win over 16-seed Wright State, hitting more than 50% of their 3-pointers to dispatch of the Raiders, with Bennedict Mathurin, Christian Koloko, and Dalen Terry all notching at least 16 points. On Sunday night, the Wildcats barely survived 9-seed TCU in an 85-80 overtime thriller, getting dynamic and impressive performances from both Mathurin (30 points, 8 rebounds) and Koloko (28 points, 12 rebounds) in the victory.
Arizona is a high-tempo, high-efficiency offense that plays some pretty solid defense as well. This team has clearly taken some enormous steps forward in Lloyd’s first year with the program, and the future certainly looks bright. For now, they have a feisty Houston squad on the schedule that could give them just as many fits as TCU.