NCAA Tournament: Brandon Knight’s First Score Gives Kentucky Win Over Princeton

Kentucky and Princeton battled back and forth all throughout their 2011 NCAA Tournament, with Brandon Knight, who’d missed all seven of his previous shots on the day, hitting the winning layup with under a second left. The Cats took a 59-57 victory, sending them on to face West Virginia in the round of 32.

Down the stretch, Princeton’s Dan Mavraides made a pair of clutch shots, teammate Kareem Maddox made another, as did Kentucky’s DeAndre Liggins. Though Knight struggled all game long, his play will still go down as the biggest of the afternoon for Kentucky.

The first upset of the 2011 NCAA Tournament is in the bag, with Morehead State stunning Louisville, and Princeton is in decent position to make a run at another. They’re down 34-33 against Kentucky at the half, but were able to score a lead in the final minutes despite opening the game down 11-2.

The SEC champions have blocked six shots and are shooting better, but they’ve also turned the ball over more and grabbed fewer rebounds. Princeton is giving themselves more opportunities to score, and they’ve done a decent job of converting.

No. 4 Kentucky vs. No. 13 Princeton is probably the best bit of cognitive dissonance available in the slate of Second Round games in the 2011 NCAA Tournament Bracket. On on hand, there’s the behemoth blue-blood, Kentucky, which is led by scandal-tarnished John Calipari and dogged by questions about whether his one-and-done-heavy approach to program-building is kosher or good for college basketball. And then there’s Princeton, which carries the scrapper’s legacy of Pete Carril and is forever remembered in the casual March Madness fan’s mind as the team that felled mighty UCLA once upon a time. If you like contrast, make sure to tune in early on Thursday — Kentucky vs. Princeton is the second CBS game of the 2011 NCAA Tournament schedule, and tips at 2:45 p.m. Thursday from Tampa.

Princeton has a ton on its plate, sure, but these Tigers are no slouches. A strong senior class, led by Ivy League Defensive Player of the Year Kareem Maddox — likely to be matched up against both Knight and Jones — turned Princeton from the Ivy League laughingstock into its king. And the Tigers showed their fortitude with wins in must-win games over Pennsylvania and Harvard in the last week; being intimidated by Kentucky, which dispatched fellow Ivy League upstart Cornell in the 2010 NCAA Tournament, seems unlikely.