Two stepping: men and women win

BUFFALO, N.Y. – Levance Fields dribbled twice and took a deep breath as he tried his best to… BUFFALO, N.Y. – Levance Fields dribbled twice and took a deep breath as he tried his best to relax on the free throw line. As the floor leader for his team, there was no way he could miss this free throw with his team tied with 11th-seeded Virginia Commonwealth and only 1.8 seconds left on the clock.

He took a deep breath, drowned out the ear-splitting noise of a packed, pro-VCU HSBC Arena as best he could and let it fly.

The ball hit the rim, popped into the air, grazed the rim once more and fell off to the side. Sam Young tried to put the ball back up, but he couldn’t get a clean look as the buzzer shrilled.

Fields had just missed two free throws, and his team, once up 19 points in the second half, was now going to overtime with a dangerous underdog that had most of the sellout crowd behind it. The sophomore took off his sweat-soaked headband and flung it into the crowd in disgust as he made his way over to the bench to talk with his team about just how they would quell this storm.

“After missing the two free throws, my teammates and coaches came up to me and told me to put it behind me and we have five more minutes to get the job done,” Fields said afterward.

So the stocky point guard did just that as he trotted back out to start overtime, not knowing that only minutes after missing the biggest shots of his young career, he was about to hit what is, by far, the biggest to date.

With the shot clock winding down and his team ahead by one in the extra session, the sophomore hit a step-back 3-pointer from the left wing with 3:10 to go. That gave Pitt what would turn out to be an insurmountable four-point lead as the Panthers outlasted Virginia Commonwealth, 84-79, in overtime Saturday, moving them into the Sweet 16 of the NCAA Tournament.

“When I took the shot, I was very confident, and when it went through the basket, it was a feeling of relief,” Fields, who scored 14 points, said.

Fields did more than just put Pitt (29-7) ahead on the shot; he sealed the deal. After his make, he collected a defensive rebound on the other end, pushed the ball up the right side and then fed teammate Ronald Ramon on the right wing. The junior opened fire with a 3-pointer, holding his follow-through as the ball whirled through the net to give Pitt a 78-71 lead and an eventual fourth Sweet 16 appearance in seven seasons.

“I’m very proud of our guys and how they responded,” head coach Jamie Dixon said. “Once we got into overtime I think it showed the true heart of our team. It took a lot to come out of the gate in overtime and do the things that we did.”

Awaiting the Panthers will be second-seeded UCLA (28-5), a team headed by former Pitt coach Ben Howland. For a while, though, it appeared Pitt wasn’t going to get the opportunity to head west, especially after the Rams put on a comeback for the ages.

Fields’ overtime heroics spoiled an astounding comeback from the Rams, who trailed 51-32 with 12:11 left in regulation. The Colonial Athletic Association champions, Virginia Commonwealth stormed all the way back to take the lead at 69-67 with 52 seconds to go in the second half. Young, who led Pitt with 15 points on the day, scored a quick bucket on the other end only four seconds later to knot the game. VCU (28-7) missed a shot, and Fields got the ball with 26 seconds to go.

He dribbled hard to the middle, drove quickly to his left and elevated to the basket. The shot went awry, but he was fouled, setting up the free throws that would lead to his headband’s dismissal and the roar of a wild crowd.

“We’re fortunate, we get great fan support from the city of Richmond,” VCU head coach Anthony Grant said. “Our fans are terrific, and they travel. I think we had a large contingent of fans here in Buffalo.”

Pitt took control early in the overtime session, going inside to the 7-foot Gray on the first two possessions, getting a bucket on the first and a free throw on the second. That pushed Pitt’s lead to three before VCU’s Eric Maynor, who hit the game-winning shot against Duke two nights before, hit a driving shot to bring it to within one before Fields took over.

“I don’t think there was any doubt in our minds that we would win the game, and that was the feeling in the huddle and what we talked about,” Dixon said. “It was a group effort as far as building us back up and getting ready to go.”

Few thought that Pitt could blow such a huge advantage, especially only two days after watching the Rams rally from 13 points down to stun sixth-seeded Duke on the same floor. Pitt appeared in total control until fouls, fatigue and turnovers clouded what appeared to be a clear, sunny path to San Jose.

Facing a constant VCU press all game, Pitt started to turn the ball over in the second half in the face of the pressure, with 11 of the give-ups coming after the first half, leading to a 23-4 VCU edge in points off turnovers.

The injuries also started to pile up for Pitt. First Cook, who had 10 points and seven rebounds in the first half alone, got injured, then Young got banged up. Gray also had 19 illness-induced minutes sitting on the bench.

“I got some type of food poisoning after the last game, and I wasn’t able to practice yesterday, and I slept about an hour last night,” Gray, who had 14 points and eight rebounds, said. “I was the last person that wanted the game to go into overtime.”

Either he or Fields could have ended it in regulation with one shot.

“We just got the job done in overtime,” he said with a relieved tone.