Will There Be No Stoppin’ Coppin State? Unknown Team Shocks South Carolina, Notching Rare Triumph For A 15th Seed

No tradition, no chance. Coppin State never had won a game in the NCAA Tournament and, with a first-round pairing against mighty South Carolina, it didn’t look like that was about to change.

Do you believe in miracles?

“We believed. We always believed,” said Danny Singletary after leading the Eagles, 30-point underdogs, to a 78-65 East Regional upset of the Gamecocks Friday.

It was only the third time in NCAA history a No. 15 seed has defeated a No. 2 seed. Neither of the other two teams to do it - Richmond against Syracuse in 1991 or Santa Clara over Arizona in 1993 - was as unknown or so overwhelming an underdog as coach Ron “Fang” Mitchell’s Eagles.

This game wasn’t expected to be close, and it wasn’t.

The Eagles (22-8) took the lead at 55-54 on Singletary’s 18-footer with 6:12 to play and steadily built it down the stretch, as the Gamecocks, the regular-season Southeastern Conference champions, watched with tears of disbelief building in their eyes.

Singletary finished with 22 points.

“We didn’t even know it was South Carolina out there,” said Reggie Welch, who had 15 rebounds as the Eagles held a 41-30 rebounding edge. “We kept on getting confidence, and before you knew it, we were up. We took it 5 minutes at a time - there’s 5 minutes, there’s 5 more.”

Before they knew it, the Gamecocks’ time was up, eliminated by a team whose last previous game against a big-name Division I team was a 36-point loss at Illinois.

“We were up by seven in the second half, but they didn’t give up,” South Carolina guard BJ McKie said. “They took it to us, and we were passive. We should have been a lot more aggressive.”

The only remotely comparable win in Coppin’s history was a 70-63 upset of Maryland in 1989. Friday’s victory was the first in NCAA history for both Coppin and its conference, the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference.

Singletary scored all but four of his points in the second half, and Antoine Brockington had 20 while badly outplaying South Carolina’s big three of Larry Davis, Melvin Watson and McKie.

The three, who had averaged a combined 47.1 points over South Carolina’s last 19 games, managed only 31, including just two by Davis, who averages 16.8. McKie had 16 and Watson had 13.

Terquin Mott, Coppin’s best player and a likely NBA draft pick, withstood a sprained ankle suffered in practice Thursday to add 11 points and 11 rebounds.

South Carolina (24-8), which had beaten Kentucky twice while winning 19 of its last 22, was regarded as a likely Final Four team - except by Mitchell, who talked openly Thursday of what he called “felling the giant.”

The upset was all the more remarkable because of Coppin State’s string of blowout losses to its better Division I opponents. The Eagles lost on the road to Oklahoma by 24, Nebraska by 16 and Illinois by 36. None of those teams were ranked nearly as high as the Gamecocks, who might have been a No. 1 seed if they hadn’t lost to Georgia in the SEC tournament.

Texas 71, Wisconsin 58

Reggie Freeman, mired in a miserable slump before the tournament began, scored 31 points as the seventhseeded Longhorns (17-11) defeated the sloppy Badgers (18-10).

Freeman made 5 of 8 shots in the first half and scored 18 points in the second after shooting just 27.6 percent in six previous games. Texas lost four of those games, including an 83-60 blowout against Colorado.

New Mexico 59, Old Dominion 55

Kenny Thomas scored 15 points and the third-seeded Lobos (25-7) shut down high-scoring Odell Hodge to defeat the Monarchs (22-11).

Old Dominion blew three chances to tie in the last 2 minutes.

Louisville 65, Massachusetts 57

DeJuan Wheat, scoreless for 19 minutes, hit three 3-pointers to start the sixth-seeded Cardinals (24-8) down the comeback trail and freshman Nate Johnson finished off the Minutemen (19-14) with his foul shooting.

Johnson scored 21 points, including 9 of 10 free throws in the second half, and Wheat - one of the nation’s top point guards - shook off a painful bout of shoulder tendinitis to score 13 of his 16 points in the second half.

MEMO: This sidebar appeared with the story: NCAA TOURNANENTS Friday’s results

Men East Regional Texas 71, Wisconsin 58 Coppin State 78, South Carolina 65 New Mexico 59, Old Dominion 55 Louisville 65, Massachusetts 57

Southeast Regional Tenn.-Chattanooga 73, Georgia 70 Illinois 90, Southern California 77 Providence 81, Marquette 59 Duke 71, Murray State 68

Midwest Regional Clemson 68, Miami, Ohio 56 Tulsa 81, Boston University 52 Temple 62, Mississippi 40 Minnesota 78, Southwest Texas 46

West Regional NC Charlotte 79, Georgetown 67 Utah 75, Navy 61 Wake Forest 68, Saint Mary’s 46 Stanford 80, Oklahoma 67

Women Midwest Regional Stephen F. Austin 79, Toledo 66 Colorado 69, Marshall 49 Duke 70, DePaul 56 Illinois 79, Drake 62

East Regional Michigan St. 75, Portland 70 (OT) North Carolina 78, Harvard 53 St. Joseph’s 70, Kansas St. 52 Alabama 94, St. Francis, Pa. 50

West Regional Arizona 76, Western Kentucky 54 Georgia 91, Eastern Kentucky 55 Utah 66, Iowa State 57 Virginia 96, Troy State 74

Mideast Regional Purdue 74, Maryland 48 Old Dominion 102, Liberty 52 Auburn 68, Louisville 65 Louisiana Tech 94, St. Peter’s 50