Sweet 16 bound: Motiejus Krivas helps Arizona basketball hold off Utah State 78-66

SAN DIEGO — Just when things started looking shaky for the Arizona Wildcats, they dug into their foundation.

Seven-foot center Motiejus Krivas had 11 points and 14 rebounds to lead Arizona to a 78-66 win over Utah State in an NCAA Tournament second round game Sunday at Viejas Arena, pushing the Wildcats into the Sweet 16 even after their 18-point lead was trimmed to just four points with five minutes left.

UA power forward Koa Peat had 14 points and 10 rebounds, while guard Brayden Burries hit a dagger 3 to put UA back in control with just over two minutes left, but it was Krivas who made a particular statement during crunch time.

The big man from Lithuania collected six rebounds during a crucial three-minute stretch late in the game after UA’s 18-point lead had been whacked.

"When the other team tries to come back, if you let us get offensive rebounds, it's really tough to keep going," Krivas said. "We knew it's a key to winning, so we just had to keep going."

It was a counter attack to the defensive pressure Utah State coach Jerrod Calhoun said bothered the Wildcats. Arizona wound up out rebounding Utah State 54-26.

"We were able to speed them up, but you can't simulate the size," Calhoun said. "That's the difference, right? That's the difference in the game -- their physicality and their size."

The win moved Arizona (34-2) into an NCAA West Sweet 16 game agaist Arkansas (28-8) on Thursday in San Jose at approximately 6:45 p.m. Utah State, the Mountain West regular-season and tournament champions, ended its season at 29-7.

While the Wildcats vastly improved the 29.0% shooting they put up in the first half, finishing at 39.3% for the game, they committed eight turnovers through the first 17 minutes after halftime against a defense that pressed and switched up its zone coverage often.

UA coach Tommy Lloyd said he found sometimes the Aggies threw out a softer press and sometimes a harder one, with early traps.

Basically, it was desperation, kitchen sink sort of thing. And it was working.

"It got us back on our heels a little bit," Lloyd said of the Aggies' defense. "They kind of amped up the heat on their press a little bit. I don't think our spacing was great. I think our initial thrust wasn't great. And that's something that is not easy to do. Everyone on the periphery thinks it should be easy to do. It's not.

"And when you have a desperate team amping up the pressure, and the jump ball's in their favor, and they're aggressive, it's hard. It's hard."

UA held just a 63-59 lead heading into the final five minutes, but outscored Utah State 10-5 over the next three minutes, getting a jumper and a free throw from Jaden Bradley, four free throws from Krivas and Burries' smooth top-of-the-key 3-pointer with 2:18 left.

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It was a reversion to his usual form on a somewhat frustrating evening for Burries, who had 16 points on 5-for-7 shooting but only played 26 minutes after sitting out much of the first half because he had two early fouls.

"I've just been getting in a lot of reps shooting, and it's just being confident and taking the shot, and it went in. I'm thankful," Burries said. "I'm not gonna sit here and lie and say I knew (it would go in), but I'm saying it felt good, though."

Earlier in the second half, it didn't appear the Wildcats would need such a bailout. UA went on a 9-0 run to take a 51-33 lead with 14:43 left, getting layups from Burries, forward Koa Peat and Bradley while Burries also sank a 3.

But the Wildcats went without a field goal over a seven-minute span in the middle of the second half, turning the ball over four times in three minutes, while Utah State crept back into the game. The Aggies shrank an 18-point UA lead to just four, 58-54, when Drake Allen hit a 3-pointer with 6:34 left.

Krivas tipped in a missed shot from Ivan Kharchenkov to put UA ahead 60-54 with just over six minutes left and Bradley converted a three-point play when he drew a foul on a layup, earning a roar from UA fans who were presumably starting to get a little nervous.

But Utah State’s Allen followed with his second 3-pointer in the half to cut the Wildcats lead to four again, 63-59, entering the final five minutes.

Meanwhile, Peat picked up his second, third and fourth fouls over the first 13 minutes of the second half after leading the Wildcats with 11 points before halftime, before Krivas led them down the stretch.

There was a lot going on, all at once.

"They're really smart on defense," Kharchenkov said. "As soon as a big guy comes up, they're trying to put a guard on him, so they don't have any disadvantage on a pick and roll. Then as soon as the big guy rolls down, the big guy comes back from the corner, and then the guard switches out to the corner when he left off."

"Their length, and aggressiveness disturbed us a little bit. But at the end of the day, we figured it out."

The first half was a somewhat different story. While UA turned the ball over only three times in the first half, the Wildcats could barely shoot it against the Utah State defense. They were just 29.0% from the field in the first half, taking a  33-24 halftime lead in part because Utah State wasn't much better at 36.7% and missed 1 of 12 3-pointers.

Arizona also scored 10 more points at the line before halftime: UA hit 11 of 17 free throws while Utah State took only two and made one of them.

UA jumped out to an early 10-2 start after Burries and Bradley hit 3-pointers in the first four minutes and the Aggies missed five straight shots.

But Burries wound up playing only seven minutes after picking up his second foul with 13:47 left before halftime while Bradley, wearing a protective wrap around his left wrist and index finger again after injuring the area on March 14 against Houston, wound up missing the eight other shots he took in the first half.

Bradley finished with 18 points on 6-for-16 shooting and didn't have an assist in a game that was less than perfect but still, as is necessary this time of year, good enough to win.

"Their defense was always doing something different, so it was kind of hard to get a flow," Bradley said. "You don't know who's going to be open, or when they're going to be open. But I feel like down the stretch, we did a decent job, and we're gonna see different defenses like this throughout the tournament. We handled it pretty well."