Winners and Losers of the Men's 2026 NCAA Tournament Saturday Elite Eight
Following Saturday's Elite Eight action in Houston and San Jose, two of the four tickets to the 2026 men's NCAA Final Four in Indianapolis officially have been punched.
Both Arizona and Illinois got out to slow starts, the former trailing by seven at halftime, the latter down by double digits before the first media timeout even arrived. However, those favorites absorbed the early body blows before asserting their dominance by the end of those heavyweight fights, each reaching a Final Four for the first time since the early 2000s.
Two more to come on Sunday when Duke battles Connecticut and Michigan takes on Tennessee.
Before we shift all focus to those upcoming marquee matchups, though, let's reflect on the night that was with some winners and losers from the first half of the Elite Eight.
Winner: Andrej Stojakovic, Illinois
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Illinois' Keaton Wagler was named the Most Outstanding Player of the South Regional, and deservedly so. He put up 25 points in quite the head-to-head duel with Bennett Stirtz on Saturday night, this after going for 13 points and 12 rebounds in the Sweet 16 victory over Houston.
But Andrej Stojakovic was the spark plug off the bench who brought the Illini back into a game that seemed to be snowballing in the wrong direction in a hurry.
Iowa was leading 12-2 less than five minutes in when Stojakovic checked in for the first time. In the blink of an eye, he had an offensive rebound, a bucket, a steal and another bucket. He added another layup two minutes later, cutting the Hawkeyes' lead to two and setting the stage for what was a phenomenal back-and-forth affair the rest of the way.
All told, Stojakovic shot 7-for-9 from the field and finished with 17 points. Save for the three free throws, all of his baskets came from within eight feet of the rim, which was a surprisingly massive factor in the Illini's win.
They had an uncharacteristically awful night from three-point range (3-for-17), but they dominated on points in the paint by a margin of 40-12.
And after Stojakovic checked in for the first time, Illinois won the rest of the game 69-47.
Loser: The Horn in Houston
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At the under-8:00 media timeout in the first half between Iowa and Illinois, the horn sounded to indicate the stoppage.
And for roughly 11 minutes, it continued to blare.
It was a nightmarish experience for everyone in the Toyota Center, but it was kind of hilarious for those of us watching at home, thanks to the commentary from the announcing crew.
"Cover your ears. Hide your eyes. The horn will not shut off." - Kevin Harlan
Robbie Hummel subsequently compared it to the "Want to hear the most annoying sound in the world?" scene from Dumb & Dumber.
After a while, they even wheeled out racks of balls so the players could stay loose.
They tried unplugging the horn, but ended up needing to turn off the entire scoreboard in the arena to put an end to the ear-splitting madness.
When the horn finally stopped, the arena erupted as if someone had just drained a half-court shot.
They never did get the scoreboard back on, though, which made the whole arena look darker, at least on television. Moreover, they had to use an air horn for the rest of the game in place of the usual alert for substitutions, media timeouts and shot-clock violations.
Winner: That Suddenly Vaunted Illini Defense
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On a few too many occasions during the regular season, Illinois had an impressive offensive performance thwarted in self-inflicted fashion by a poor defensive effort.
The Illini twice allowed Wisconsin to score more than 90 points in an overtime affair. They also allowed 95 to UCLA, 90 to Alabama, 85 to Michigan State, 84 to Michigan and 83 to Nebraska. They lost all seven of those games, but they did survive the 88-82 game at Purdue in which Keaton Wagler went for a heroic 46 points.
This left many a bracket-filler-outer to worry at what point in the tournament this team was destined to bow out because of a no-show on that end of the floor.
Lo and behold, Illinois has turned into the 2012-20 Virginia Cavaliers, repeatedly holding its opponents below 60 points.
The Illini did get whistled for some fouls for a change against Iowa, and they couldn't completely shut down Bennett Stirtz, who finished with 24 points. However, they made life miserable for everyone else in a Hawkeyes jersey.
Maybe most notable of all: Alvaro Folgueiras was a complete non-factor, held scoreless in just nine minutes played after scoring at least 14 points in each of Iowa's first three tournament games.
Previously mentioned Winner Andrej Stojakovic was crucial on that end of the floor, too, his 6'7" size at the 2 causing major issues down the stretch as Illinois pulled away.
Winner: Purdue's First-Half Gameplan/Execution
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To the surprise of many, Purdue took a 38-31 lead into the intermission against an Arizona team that previously had not trailed in the NCAA tournament.
How did the Boilermakers do it?
For starters, they hit their shots.
That's a super novel concept, I know. But Braden Smith drained three triples, looking like he might take this game over by himself. Gicarri Harris provided a rather unexpected pair of threes off the bench, too, as Purdue shot a combined 7-for-14 from distance.
Meanwhile, Arizona went 1-for-6 on its typical lower quantity of three-point attempts. However, it wasn't able to dominate in the paint like it has all season. In fact, Purdue won the first-half rebounding battle by a +5 margin against a team that usually finishes games at around a +12.
In some ways, it looked like Arizona just took the first half for granted. Purdue played great, but the Wildcats settled a bit, got pushed around by Oscar Cluff and didn't seem to get the memo that Purdue has at least three really good three-point shooters on the floor at all times.
There was a second half of the game, though...
Loser: Preseason No. 1 vs. Actual No. 1
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Everything that went right for Purdue in the first half?
It went so very, very wrong after the intermission.
Purdue shot just 1-for-8 from three-point range in the second half, while Arizona further flipped that script by going 4-for-9 from distance.
And of the many things Tommy Lloyd said in that locker room, one was clearly a heads up to Ivan Kharchenkov that Purdue's defenders could not stay in front of him. The often overlooked freshman of the trio in this starting lineup started getting downhill almost whenever he wanted, going 4-for-4 on his two-point attempts as well as 4-for-4 on his free-throw attempts in the second half, ending up with 18 points and eight rebounds.
He scored 12 in the latter 20 minutes, but Brayden Burries had 11 while Koa Peat and Jaden Bradley each chipped in 10. And though Motiejus Krivas only scored two points after the break, he still impacted the game in a big way with eight rebounds, two assists, a block, a steal and solid defense on Purdue's big men.
Throw in Anthony Dell'Orso hitting that early dagger of a three-pointer that put the Wildcats ahead by six less than eight minutes after they trailed by seven and it was just another "all hands on deck" night at the office for the Wildcats.
It took the diesel engine on this wagon a little longer than usual to get warmed up, but Arizona simply ran away from a darn good Purdue team, winning the second half by a margin of 48-26.
Not to put the cart before the horse here—as Tennessee does still have a say in the matter on Sunday afternoon—but we are on the precipice of an Arizona-Michigan Final Four game that could be downright legendary.
Winner: International Interest in the Final Four
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Without having any clue what the all-time record is for overseas television sets tuned into the men's Final Four, there's a good chance that record gets shattered this year.
Illinois has David Mirkovic from Montenegro as one of its leading scorers, plus gigantic twins Tomislav and Zvonimir Ivisic from Croatia. Might also get some eyes from Serbia for Mihailo Petrovic, although he has played just five minutes in this tournament.
Then you've got Arizona, with half of its eight-man rotation coming from overseas. Motiejus Krivas hails from Lithuania, Ivan Kharchenkov is from Germany, Anthony Dell'Orso is from Australia and though Dwayne Aristode moved to USA to play at New Hampshire's Brewster Academy a few years ago, he grew up in the Netherlands before playing in Spain.
But wait, there's more.
If Duke comes out of the East Region, Dame Sarr is from Italy. Or if it's UConn pulling off the slight upset instead, Eric Reibe is from Germany—and could be a key factor off the bench in making that upset happen.
And then in the Midwest clash, Michigan's Aday Mara is from Spain while Tennessee's Felix Okpara was a soccer player from Nigeria before he moved to USA as a teenager to play basketball.
Regardless of how Sunday plays out, you're talking about at least nine key players with international backgrounds. Should be a lot of global interest in Indianapolis next weekend.
