INDIANAPOLIS — Colorado’s KJ Simpson hit a baseline jumper with one second remaining Friday to give the Buffaloes a heart-stopping 102-100 win over Florida in the NCAA Tournament Round of 64 at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.
Tad Boyle‘s 10th-seeded Buffs improved to 26-10 and will play No. 2 seed Marquette on Sunday.
The victory gave Colorado back-to-back NCAA Tournament wins for the first time since the 1955 Buffaloes advanced to the Final Four. The 102 points were also the most ever by the Buffs in the tournament, surpassing the 96 they scored against Georgetown in a 2021 victory.
The seventh-seeded Gators saw their season end at 24-12.
Simpson led the Buffs with 23 points. Eddie Lampkin Jr. scored 21, Tristan da Silva tallied 17, J’Vonne Hadleyadded 16 and Luke O’Brien chipped in 12.
Walter Clayton Jr. led Florida with 33.
The Buffs trailed by 10 early in the game but fought back to knot the score at 45-45 at intermission. CU then used an 11-2 run early in the second half to take control and held a 13-point lead, 94-81, with just 4:28 to play.
But the CU offense, which had scored on 14 straight possessions, went cold and the Gators rallied. Florida’s Clayton scored 16 points in the final 3:46 to fuel a 19-6 Gators run and his 3-pointer with 9 seconds remaining tied the game at 100-100.
That, though, was just enough time for the Buffs to bring the ball up court and call a timeout. Simpson took the inbounds pass from Cody Williams, dribbled to the baseline and launched a jumper that bounced on the rim three times before dropping through the net with 1 second on the clock.
HOW IT HAPPENED: The two teams battled to a 45-45 tie at the break after a first half that featured 10 lead changes.
The two teams then traded the lead three more times early in the second half before Colorado put together an 11-2 run that finished with a 6-0 burst.
Tristan da Silva started the run with a 3-pointer, followed by an Eddie Lampkin Jr. tip-in, two free throws from KJ Simpson and back-to-back buckets from Luke O’Brien.
O’Brien’s second bucket gave the Buffs a 65-58 lead — their biggest of the game to that point — and prompted a Florida timeout with 12:25 to play.
Colorado maintained control out of the break, pushing its lead to 75-66 on a Lampkin basket inside with 9:13 to play.
Florida came back to shave CU’s lead to five, 77-72, on 3-pointers from Will Richard and Riley Kugle.
But Lampkin scored again inside on a play that incensed the Florida bench and resulted in a technical foul on Gators coach Todd Golden.
That resulted in three straight CU free throws — two by J’Vonne Hadley on the technical and one from Lampkin on the and-one basket — and Colorado bumped its lead to double digits, 82-72, with 7:44 to play.
Colorado built its lead to 13 over the next two minutes. CU hit three more free throws and Cody Williamsscored inside for a 5-0 run and the Buffs led by 13, 92-79, with under five minutes to play.
The Buffs scored on 14 straight possessions in the stretch and still had a 94-81 lead after a da Silva dunk with 4:28 to play.
But the Gators staged a late comeback. Colorado came up empty on five consecutive trips down the floor and the Gators cut the Buffs’ cushion to six, 94-88, with a 7-0 run.
Williams stopped the Florida run with a pair of free throws but the Gators shaved the lead to four on a Walter Clayton three-point play.
Simpson briefly pushed CU’s led back to six with a drive to the basket with 48 seconds remaining only to see Clayton drain a 3-pointer with 37 seconds left to cut Colorado’s edge to 99-96.
The Buffs then turned the ball over on the ensuing inbounds play. Clayton was fouled and hit one of two free throws with 22 seconds before Williams hit one of two for Colorado to give the Buffs a 100-97 lead with 14 seconds left.
But Clayton hit a long 3-pointer with 9 seconds remaining to tie the game at 100-100 and the Buffaloes called timeout with 6 seconds remaining.
That was enough time for Simpson to take the inbounds pass and nail a shot from the baseline with 1 second on the clock remaining to give the Buffs the victory.
After a see-saw opening few minutes, Colorado fell behind as the Gators hit 10 of their first 19 shots, including three 3-pointers, to take a 24-14 lead less than eight minutes in.
But the Buffs withstood the early barrage and fought back. Bangot Dak scored inside to start a 10-2 run, followed by a Tristan da Silva dunk, a Luke O’Brien drive to the hoop and two free throws apiece from J’Vonne Hadley and Cody Williams.
With 8:31 to play in the first half, the Buffs had shaved the deficit to 26-24.
CU continued to chip away at the Gators’ edge. Simpson re-entered the game after a brief respite on the bench and hit a 3-pointer to cut Florida’s lead to one. Eddie Lampkin Jr. finally gave Colorado its first lead since the opening minutes with a bucket inside for a 36-35 CU edge at the 3:34 mark.
The two teams then traded the lead five more times over the next three minutes before Simpson hit a 15-footer just before the halftime buzzer to send the two teams into the break tied at 45-45.
Both teams shot well in the first half. CU hit 17-of-28 tries from the floor while Florida shot 17-for-33. The Buffs also had 14 assists with Simpson and da Silva each scoring nine points.
NEXT UP: Colorado now faces No. 2 seed Marquette on Sunday at Gainbridge Fieldhouse.
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Story by Neill Woelk, Contributing Editor for CUBuffs.com. Content courtesy of the University of Colorado at Boulder.
