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College Basketball

March Madness upset: Baylor is first No. 1 seed eliminated, falling to North Carolina in OT

Andrew Olson

By Andrew Olson

Published:

College basketball will be crowning a new national champion as at least one No. 1 seed won’t be making it to the Sweet 16. Baylor, the East Region’s No. 1 seed, was eliminated in the Round of 32, falling to No. 8-seed North Carolina 93-86.

North Carolina’s R.J. Davis was the game’s leading scorer with 30 points, going 8-of-17 from the field, including 5-of-10 from 3-point range. UNC’s Brady Manek had 26 points at the time of his second-half ejection. The Bears were led by Adam Flagler’s 27 points.

Baylor is the latest defending champion to fall short of going back-to-back.

It was a wild ride to overtime. Baylor led 4-0 early, but North Carolina went up 6-0 at the 17:18 mark of the first half and was in the lead all the way until the final buzzer.

The Tar Heels led by as many as 25 points. It was a 67-42 UNC lead with 10:49 left in the second half. Baylor erased that deficit, though, cutting it to single digits in the final 4 minutes of the game. Manek’s absence loomed large after his ejection.

With under 17 seconds left, Baylor’s James Akinjo tied it up 80-80 on a 3-point play, making a free throw after being fouled on a layup.

Andrew Olson

Andrew writes about sports to fund his love of live music and collection of concert posters. He strongly endorses the Hall of Fame campaigns of Fred Taylor and Andruw Jones.

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