Arkansas Advances To NCAA Tournament’s Sweet 16 After 0-5 SEC Start

At 6:10 p.m. Saturday, John Calipari stepped into the passenger seat of a red Jeep Wagoneer, leaving the Amica Mutual Pavilion in Providence, R.I. The Arkansas men’s basketball coach had just led the No. 10 seed Razorbacks to a 75-66 victory over No. 2 seed St. John’s in an NCAA tournament West Regional second round game. Calipari improved to 4-0 in games at the arena, including consecutive victories in the 1996 NCAA first and second round when his University of Massachusetts team was ranked No. 1 in the nation.

Still, what Arkansas accomplished this weekend in Providence was much more surprising and likely more satisfying to Calipari. Nine weeks ago, Arkansas lost, 83-65, at Missouri, falling to 0-5 in the Southeastern Conference. The Razorbacks were seemingly out of contention for an NCAA berth. It wasn’t what anyone expected last April when Calipari agreed to a five-year contract with a base salary of $7 million per year, leaving Kentucky after 15 seasons.

Calipari was once heralded at Kentucky, signing top recruiting classes, sending players to the NBA and winning big. In fact, in Calipari’s first 10 seasons, the Wildcats won the NCAA championship in 2012, made it to the national title game in 2014, advanced to the Final Four two other times and lost in the Elite 8 on three other occasions. But in his final five seasons, Kentucky never made it past the second round, including a first round loss last March to No. 14 seed Oakland that hastened Calipari’s decision to leave for Arkansas.

A year later, Calipari is back in the Sweet 16 for the first time since 2019. The Razorbacks face No. 3 seed Texas Tech Thursday night in San Francisco. Calipari, who turned 66 last month, is just the second coach in NCAA history to take four teams (UMass, Memphis, Kentucky and Arkansas) to the Sweet 16. In all, he has made 16 Sweet 16’s. And he now has 877 career victories, surpassing former Kentucky coach Adolph Rupp for sole possession of eighth place on the all-time list.

The only active coach ahead of Calipari? St. John’s coach Rick Pitino, his longtime rival who is stuck at 885 wins. Calipari now leads Pitino 14-10 in head-to-head matchups in college, including three victories in five NCAA tournament games. Calipari also has 59 NCAA tournament victories in his career, the most among active coaches and sixth all-time.

On Saturday, most people in the crowd cheered for St. John’s, as the school is about 175 miles from Providence, making it convenient for fans to make the drive. Plus, New England fans still have fondness for Pitino, who coached at Providence College for two seasons and led the Friars to the 1987 Final Four, just the second (and last) time PC advanced that far in the NCAA tournament.

Pitino had a similar turnaround in his second season at St. John’s, leading the Red Storm to their first Big East regular season title since 1985 and first Big East tournament championship and NCAA tournament victory since 2000. On Saturday, the Red Storm trailed 55-42 before getting it to within 62-60 with 6:11 remaining, leading to “Let’s Go Johnnies!” chants from the crowd. Arkansas then went on a 13-6 run to close it out, snapping St. John’s 10-game winning streak and handing the Red Storm (31-5) their most decisive loss of the season. Before Saturday, St. John’s had lost its four games by a combined seven points.

“I hate to see them go out this way,” Pitino said. “We thought we were championship-driven in our minds, but I have been disappointed before with this. You hate to see us play like that. I don’t mind going out with a loss, I just hate to see us play that way offensively. You gotta live with it. You put in a lot of time and effort, the coaches did, and it’s just a bitter pill to swallow with that type of performance.”

St. John’s had 51 rebounds (28 on the offensive end) and committed only six turnovers, but the Red Storm shot just 28% from the field, including 2 of 22 on 3-pointers (9.1%). Arkansas didn’t shoot much better, connecting on 42.9% of its field goals and 2 of 19 on 3’s (10.5%). But the Razorbacks had 45 rebounds and shot 19-of-27 on free throws, including 5 of 6 in the final 19.2 seconds.

“Was it an ugly game or was it a game that was exciting?,” Calipari said. “Like, both? An ugly exciting game. You know I don’t care. It could be an ugly-ugly game and I’m happy we’re moving on.”

Said sophomore starting guard D.J. Wagner: “We always stayed confident with each other, no matter what type of situation we were in. That’s just the game of basketball. It’s ups and downs…I feel like that helped us going 0-5 (in the SEC) because now we know how to respond to adversity.”

Billy Richmond III, a freshman reserve, led the Razorbacks with a career-high 16 points and 9 rebounds, while fellow freshman Karter Knox had 15 points and senior guard Johnell Davis had 13 points. Richmond, Knox and fellow freshman Boogie Fland (6 points) had committed to Kentucky but followed Calipari to Arkansas. Davis, meanwhile, transferred from Florida Atlantic, which he had led to the 2023 Final Four.

Arkansas, in fact, only has one player (starting forward Travon Brazile) who played for the Razorbacks last season. The rest of the team are freshmen or transfers, including Wagner and reserve forward Zvonimir Ivisic, who played for Calipari at Kentucky, and Jonas Aidoo, who played three seasons at Tennessee. Adou Thiero, who played at Kentucky the past two seasons, leads the team in scoring (15.6) and rebounding (6.0), but he has missed the past eight games due to a left knee injury.

“There was a lot of stuff they overcame, and I keep reminding them how much you have overcome,” Calipari said. “You guys think winning and losing. These kids have a piano on their back. It’s never been this way in all my years of coaching, because NIL, if a kid got money, it’s just more weight and now the families are more involved than they’ve ever been. Why? NIL.”

He added: “So now all of a sudden, they got the people around them, they got the piano on their back. They miss a shot now, social media tees off on you. Are you really looking at that stuff? For them to do what they did and then were still playing…Like I said prior to the game, how about we give ourselves a chance to make some magic? Let’s go fight like heck, play free and loose, whatever happens happens. But let’s go see if we can create magic.”

Outside the Arkansas locker room Saturday night, Ellen Calipari, the coach’s wife, stood next to their daughter, Megan. The two were waiting to greet John Calipari, as well as Brad Calipari, the coach’s son who is an assistant on the Arkansas staff. The past year hasn’t always been easy for the family, starting with Kentucky’s loss in the first round last March and continuing through the move to Arkansas and the Razorbacks’ struggles early in the season. Now, Arkansas has won seven of its past nine games, and Calipari is back to the Sweet 16, something that once seemed routine.

“It’s always hard to get a new group of guys going and getting them to do things together and see things for each other,” Ellen Calipari said. “It’s just been amazing to watch. It just gives you so much more satisfaction when you see them have the success. They deserve it. They’ve earned it.”