For the fourth time in the history of the men’s NCAA Tournament, a 15-seed will be participating in the second weekend. The Princeton Tigers, which stunned the 2-seed Arizona Wildcats in their opener in the South Region, put forth quite the performance in their second act. Princeton throttled Missouri in a battle of the Tigers, 78-63, to punch their ticket to the Sweet 16.
As is oftentimes the case in an upset in the Tournament, the great equalizer was the three-point line. While both of these teams are not shy about letting it fly from deep, Princeton doubled up Missouri in made triples, hitting 12 to the SEC side’s six. Ryan Langborg led the way, as 12 of his game-high 22 points came on threes. Blake Peters added another 17 points off of the bench and hit five of his eight shots from three.
With the win, Princeton joins quite the list of squads to make it to the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament despite being in the field as a 15-seed. The first team to pull it off was the Florida Gulf Coast squad affectionately known as “Dunk City” in 2013, followed by Oral Roberts in 2021 and Saint Peter’s last year. Of those three squads, only the Peacocks managed to advance to the Elite 8, where they lost to the eventual national runners-up, North Carolina.
The Tigers will now wait until tomorrow to figure out who they’re going to end up playing. Princeton will take on the winner of the 3-6 matchup between Baylor and Creighton.
