Arizona men’s basketball vs. Dayton final score: Wildcats hold off Flyers, advance to 2nd Sweet 16 in 3 years

SALT LAKE CITY—Arizona played some of its best and worst basketball in the same game on Saturday. Thankfully, there was more of the former, especially down the stretch.

The second-seeded Wildcats led to the final 37-plus minutes, though it tried really hard at times to blow a 17-point edge in the middle, in a 78-68 win over No. 7 Dayton in the second round of the NCAA Tournament at the Delta Center.

The win advances the UA (27-8) to its second Sweet 16 in three years under Tommy Lloyd. The Wildcats will play Thursday in the West Region semifinals in Los Angeles against either No. 3 Baylor or No. 6 Clemson, who play Sunday in Memphis.

Arizona shot 52.8 percent, including 64 percent in the 1^st half, and made 8 of 18 3-pointers while holding Dayton (25-8) to 29.2 percent from outside. The Flyers came in shooting 40.2 percent from 3.

Caleb Love led the UA with 19 points, 13 coming in the first 12 minutes, while Keshad Johnson and Pelle Larsson had 13 and Jaden Bradley added 12 off the bench. The Wildcats’ reserves outscored Dayton’s 23-2.

Dayton, which shot 40.7 percent overall, got 23 points and 11 rebounds from former UA target DaRon Holmes II.

Arizona led 40-33 at halftime after being up 17, as Dayton went into the locker room on a 10-0 run and scored nine points off 11 UA turnovers. Johnson hit a 3 to get the lead back to 10 before the Flyers scored six in a row to get within 43-39 with 15:07 left.

After shooting 64 percent in the 1^st half, Arizona missed 6 of 7 to open the 2^na half.

A Koby Brea 3 cut it to 52-49 with 11:42 remaining but the Wildcats quickly got the cushion back to at least two scores. They got the lead back to double digits at 63-51 with 7:50 to go on a KJ Lewis drive off Kylan Boswell steal after Larsson drained a 3 on the previous possession.

A Bradley 3 made it 66-51 with 6:51 left when the same kind of sloppiness that dwindled the big 1st-half lead popped up again. That allowed Dayton to go on a 6-0 run and get within nine.

The Wildcats also decided to slow things down in the halfcourt, and that resulted in a Bradley drive and reverse and Larsson draining a fallaway jumper both with the shot clock winding down. Then Larsson drew an offensive foul on Holmes, which was upgraded to a flagrant, but the UA only got a point out of it as Larsson made 1 of 2 free throws and didn’t score on the ensuing possession.

A 3-point play by Holmes made it 71-62 with 2:13 left, and two more free throws made it a 7-point game with 55.1 seconds to go, but Boswell made two foul shots and then Bradley stripped Holmes in the paint. Lewis then made two at the line, part of an 8 for 8 performance in the final 53 seconds.

Arizona went inside early and often to start, with its first five shots (and three makes) coming in the paint. That opened things up for Love to start hitting from outside, his first 3 part of a 12-2 run for a 17-8 lead that included him making a stepback long 2.

The Flyers didn’t attempt their first 3 until the 12:26 mark of the 1^st half, with Brea airballing it, but Brea hit a pair over the next two minutes to get Dayton within 20-14.

Two more Love 3s and a pair of Oumar Ballo scores inside increased it to 30-16 with 7:37 left, and the lead swelled to 40-23 with 2:43 remaining before halftime. But then Arizona got sloppy, with its passing, ball handling and footwork, turning it over four times in the final 2:06 to give Dayton the fuel to cut it to seven at the break.