Hamilton's rebound jumper in the lane at the buzzer, Connecticut's third shot in the final eight seconds, gave the second-seeded Huskies a 75-74 victory over Washington in the East Regional semifinals yesterday.
Connecticut (32-4) will play top-seeded and top-ranked North Carolina, which beat fourth-seeded Michigan State 73-58, in Saturday's regional final with a berth in the Final Four at stake.
"It has been a season of buzzer-beaters and you can add our name to the list," Connecticut coach Jim Calhoun said.
"I guess we wanted to be included in everything."
Washington (20-10), the 11th seed which had one of the tournament's more surprising runs, took its first lead at 74-73 with 33 seconds left on a 3-pointer by Donald Watts.
Connecticut called a timeout with 29 seconds remaining.
"When you go to the sidelines at a timeout you never think you're going to lose," Watts said.
"I thought I put us over the top but they didn't give up and they won."
Freshman point guard Khalid El-Amin dribbled the ball near midcourt until there were 10 seconds left. He drove toward the basket and passed the ball to center Jake Voskuhl, whose shot bounced off the rim. Hamilton got the rebound and shot, again with the ball coming back off the rim.
After it was tipped from the other side, Hamilton grabbed the loose ball and hit a fadeaway jumper over 7-foot Patrick Femerling, the ball falling through the basket as the buzzer sounded.
Utah 65, W. Virginia 62
Jarrod West couldn't come up with another miracle for West Virginia, and this time, he even had three chances.
Michael Doleac made two free throws with 6.5 seconds remaining and West missed a 3-pointer as time expired as Utah held off the Mountaineers 65-62 in the West Regional semifinals last night.
"I had good looks at them, they just didn't fall down for me," said a tearful West, whose final 3-pointer would have forced overtime.
"I thought he made it,'' Doleac said. "It hit the front rim. Thank God the clock ran out, their pressure gets to you."
Andre Miller, guarding West on the final play, said his main concern was to not commit a foul.
"If he makes it, it's OK," Miller said. "If it did go into overtime, we probably would have won."
Utah, seeded third, faces top-seeded Arizona tomorrow with a spot in the Final Four at stake. The Sun Devils beat Maryland 87-79 in the other regional semifinal.
Arizona 87, Maryland 79
There's no stopping Arizona's scoring spurts.
Playing their closest game yet in the NCAA tournament, the top-seeded Wildcats turned their scoring on and off at will, getting a flurry of points when they needed them.
And they did against Maryland.
Mike Bibby scored 18 of his 26 points in the first half as defending champion Arizona defeated the fourth-seeded Terrapins 87-79 Thursday night to advance to the West Regional final.
The Wildcats (30-4) will play No. 3 Utah on Saturday. The Utes were 65-62 winners over 10th-seeded West Virginia.
The Terrapins (21-11) were the only team in the field to beat two of the top seeds during the regular season, but victories over North Carolina and Kansas couldn't prepare them for Arizona's lethal transition game.
After trailing by 14 early in the second half, Maryland closed within one with 10:32 remaining. Arizona simply kicked in its speedy offensive game, reeling off nine straight points to put down the Terps' threat.
Michael Dickerson had five points in the run that increased Arizona's lead to 66-56. The Terps never got closer than five the rest of the way.
03-20-98
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