The Kansas Jayhawks bounced the Villanova Wildcats from the Final Four in an impressive fashion. Villanova played well without a key player, but they were unable to overcome an early Kansas run.
Kansas Dominates Villanova in the Final Four
First Half
The Kansas Jayhawks and Villanova Wildcats opened up the evening in a game that sadly wasn’t very close at the end. Kansas controlled things early, taking a 40-29 lead into the locker room for halftime. A few early turnovers from the Wildcats helped them to dig themselves into a 10-0 run to begin the game. David McCormack and Jalen Wilson led the Kansas offense to build a 19-point lead in the final four minutes of the first half. Villanova clearly missed Justin Moore, who was injured in the final minutes of their Elite Eight victory. The Wildcats endured a poor shooting night from the floor with the team combining 22-57 for the game, good for only 38.6%. Conversely, the Jayhawks shot at a 53.7% success rate, while also hitting 13-24 from deep.
Second Half
Although the second half was a more competitive one, the Jayhawks still outscored Villanova 40-36. Both teams’ bench units were non-factors in this one. Each team had only five points come from players not in their starting five. Even Remy Martin, a new hero for the Hawks and a favorite story amongst tournament watchers, was quiet in this one. Martin has three points and five rebounds in this one. Villanova battled the whole way through this one. Collin Gillespie led them in scoring with 17 points. Brandon Slater and Caleb Daniels also scored 16 and 13 points respectively in the loss. Jermaine Samuels also played well for the Wildcats, scoring nine points and grabbing seven boards, but it was not enough to keep the short-handed ‘cats in this one.
While McCormack was the Jayhawks leading scorer, Ochai Agbaji was nearly perfect from the field, including 6-7 from beyond the arc on his way to 21 points. Christian Braun and Wilson were also double-digit contributors this evening. Kansas sets their sights on a fourth NCAA National Championship in program history on Monday night.
Main Photo
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