Wilmont's Hot Shooting Carries Hoosers to Win

Indiana 70, Gonzaga 57

Indiana head coach Kelvin Sampson watches his team during practice in preparation for the first round of the West regional basketball tournament in Sacramento, Calif., Wednesday, March 14, 2007.(AP Photo/Marcio Jose Sanchez) (Marcio Jose Sanchez - AP)

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- Kelvin Sampson preached playing smart and doing things the right way with maximum effort at all times, benching anyone who couldn't oblige. His players bought into his no-nonsense system after hearing the first-year Indiana coach tell them again and again it eventually would pay off. How about a second-round NCAA tournament date with Pac-10 champion UCLA as proof?

Roderick Wilmont scored 22 points and hit six of his team's nine 3-pointers, and the Hoosiers avenged a loss to Gonzaga last March with a 70-57 victory Thursday night in a West Regional matchup pitted as one of the top first-round games in the tournament.

"I love the way we won the game," Sampson said. "We're not an offensive juggernaut. We had to play tough defense, make the extra pass and execute."

Wilmont shot 8-for-16 and also added seven rebounds, three assists and a steal to extend his senior season for seventh-seeded Indiana (21-10), which was eliminated by the Zags 90-80 in a second-round meeting a year ago.

The scrappy Hoosiers, with their signature candy cane warmup pants and blue-collar swagger, have rarely played pretty basketball in the process to get this far _ yet they showed none of that matters now. They're alive for another game, snapping the Zags' streak of four straight years winning their NCAA opener. Indiana will play UCLA, last year's NCAA runner-up, in the second round Saturday night, the first meeting between the schools since the Hoosiers won their Elite Eight meeting in 1992.

"I think they have a better team than last year, and they were in the championship game," Sampson said.

Band members chanted "Kelvin Sampson! Kelvin Sampson!" as the clocked ticked away in the final minute.

Indiana leading scorer D.J. White, who missed last year's loss to Gonzaga because of a broken left foot, scored all but two of his 16 points in the second half as the Hoosiers quickly took control and built on their 34-29 lead at the break.

David Pendergraft had 12 points and five rebounds and Sean Mallon 11 points and six boards for 10th-seeded Gonzaga (23-11), which missed too many easy scoring chances and went one-and-out in its ninth straight NCAA appearance. The defeat ended a tumultuous season for the tiny Spokane, Wash., school, which only last month lost starting center Josh Heytvelt to a drug arrest and indefinite suspension from the program.

"This year is the toughest year by far since I've been playing," Pendergraft said.

Gonzaga's Derek Raivio _ who came in averaging a team-best 18.2 points and is college basketball's all-time career free-throw percentage leader at 92.7 percent (343-of-370) based on 300 made shots and 2.5 per game _ faced tight pressure on the perimeter all game and finished with 12 points on 4-for-10 shooting and four assists in his final college game. He did not show nearly the emotion that do-everything star Adam Morrison did a year ago in the team's heartbreaking 73-71 regional semifinal loss to UCLA _ and ultimately his collegiate farewell before bolting to the NBA _ when he lay sprawled across midcourt in Oakland.

"Some of our guys played passive," a stone-faced Raivio said. "You know, it looked like it wasn't meant to be. We had easy shots on the rim, but we just couldn't knock them down."