What happened in the NCAA Men's Tournament Sweet 16

DETROIT — Purdue versus Tennessee with a shot at the Final Four anyone? One team hasn’t been to the national semifinals for 44 years and the other has never been. Both have devoted fan bases who have been teased with great teams and yet never rewarded. The Boilermakers rely on a player ranked 436th coming out of high school, who is now working on his second national player of the year award.

The Vols count on a guy who couldn’t even earn second-team All-Big Sky a year ago and is now an All-American. Matt Painter is the coach who can’t get to the Final Four; Rick Barnes is the guy who can’t win a title.

Yes, I believe we can work with this.

Clemson-Alabama (Clemson won in Tuscaloosa in November); Purdue-Tennessee (Purdue won in the Maui Invitational) and NC State-Duke (teams split a pair of meetings, with NC State winning in the ACC tournament). Purdue actually played Gonzaga and Tennessee on back-to-back days in Honolulu and the Boilers will have to repeat that feat in three days to make the Final Four.

DALLAS —Houston never quite looked the same after Jamal Shead's first-half injury. Now the Cougars are heading home, and Duke is going to the Sweet 16.

The Blue Devils beat the top-seeded Cougars 54-51 on Friday night. They'll face a familiar foe in the Elite Eight: fellow ACC member NC State, which beat Marquette earlier in the night.

Potential lottery pick Kyle Filipowski led the way for Duke with 16 points and nine rebounds. J'Wan Roberts had 13 points and eight rebounds for Houston, which entered the game allowing an NCAA-best 57.7 points per game and kept Duke below that mark.

Shead had two points and three assists before leaving the game with an apparent ankle injury with a little less than seven minutes left in the first half.

DALLAS — Duke's Ryan Young just fouled out after a four-point, four-rebound night, and after a missed Kyle Filipowski jumper, it's Houston's ball, down 54-51, with 16 seconds left. The Cougars saw in their last game that A LOT can happen in the final seconds of regulation. So ... this one isn't over quite yet.

DALLAS — As DJ Burns Jr. walked over to the roaring NC State fan section in the American Airlines Center, he held both forearms up, elbow down and palms facing the sky. Teammates followed with the same pose. A simple shrug and a smile. That look sums up this current NC State team. An improbable run at a school known for some improbable runs, now heading to the program’s first Elite Eight in 38 years after handling No. 2 seed Marquette 67-58. Where the heck did these guys come from? A No. 11 seed in the NCAA Tournament. A team that wasn’t even on the bubble until five wins in five days in Washington D.C. to win the ACC tournament. It’s now eight in a row.

DALLAS — We've got a good (albeit low-scoring) one going at American Airlines Center with about three minutes left. Duke leads 52-48. Houston won't go away, but the Cougars can't quite get over the hump.

There's a fan who keeps holding up a Ted Lasso-inspired "Believe" sign about a dozen or so rows behind the Houston bench. Belief is nice and all, but the Cougars need buckets (and stops) in these final minutes.

DETROIT — Well then. That’s a nice tidy little 18-0 run in under five minutes from Tennessee that has left Creighton nearing a TKO.

The Bluejays truly look like they don’t know what hit them. On the last three, this one from Josiah-Jordan James, Trey Alexander threw up his hand, hoping to try to distract James. He didn’t. As the ball went in the air, Alexander’s shoulders slumped, as if he knew it was going in.

Necessary timeout by Greg McDermott but it might be too late to revive Creighton.

DALLAS — Not long before the under-11 timeout, Houston forward Ja'Vier Francis airballed a short jumper from the baseline.

It was pretty clear that Francis was a little down on himself after the miss. As the Cougars huddled up, Cedric Lath and others could be seen patting Francis on the back and shoulder as Francis nodded along, presumably agreeing with some words of encouragement from teammates.

Francis has seven points and seven boards so far, so he's been far from invisible. If he steps up his game even more in the final 10 or so minutes, that sideline pick-me-up may be a turning point.

DALLAS — Not that it's a great strength of the team, but we're about 25 minutes into the game, and Houston has yet to hit a 3-pointer (the Cougars only have taken four).

Duke, by comparison, is 4-of-13 from beyond the arc. Could certainly see a couple of timely long-range shots being the difference down the line if this one stays as tight as it's been since the first couple of minutes.

CBS's Tracy Wolfson said that Jamal Shead got X-rays at halftime and they were negative. His ankle is heavily taped and the team is leaving the door open that he could still return to the game. He started the second half on the bench.

DALLAS — The Duke mascot is wearing tape on its head gear that reads, "Houston, you have a problem."

Simple, effective and gets the message across. No notes. 10/10.

DETROIT —With Tennessee senior guard Santiago Vescovi out with the flu and officially “day to day,” and with the plan to compensate for his loss disrupted by foul trouble, the Vols let Creighton loose late in the first half Friday at Little Caesar’s Arena.

The Bluejays lead 35-34 at the break and finished the half on a surge, though neither team has led by more than four. Creighton got 15 points from All-America wing Baylor Scheierman. Jahmai Mashack and Jordan Gainey – the two players whose minutes stood to increase from Vescovi’s absence – both picked up two fouls in the second half, and Rick Barnes kept them on the bench.

He went deep into that bench, finding minutes for seldom-used guard Freddie Dilione and Cameron Carr, along with big man JP Estrella. Carr promptly hit a 3-pointer after entering the game, helping the Vols stabilize late in the half. Dalton Knecht has 10 points and Zakai Zeigler has seven points and four assists. The Vols are 5-for-10 from 3-point range after going 3-for-25 in their round-of-32 win over Texas.

The second half may be as simple as which star transfer, Scheierman or Knecht, can make more plays.