Pac-12 Tournament 2012: Colorado Books NCAA Tournament Trip With Win Over Arizona

For more on the two teams, head over to Arizona Wildcats blog Arizona Desert Swarm and Colorado Buffaloes blog The Ralphie Report. For more on the entire tournament, check out Pacific Takes and our Pac-12 Tournament StoryStream.

Even though the game will be played inside Staples Center, Saturday’s Pac-12 championship game between Arizona and Colorado will contain all the desperation of a mid-major title bout where both teams are fighting for their NCAA Tournament lives.

Just two Pac-12 teams began the postseason with legitimate hopes of landing an at-large bid into the big dance, and neither of them were Arizona or Colorado.

Colorado defeated their tournament quarterfinal and semifinal opponents -- Oregon and California -- in Boulder in the regular season, but lost to them away. Neutral site games were expected for favor Oregon and Cal, but the Buffs came through in both cases. On Saturday, they face another team in Arizona that they split with in the regular season.

Game Date/Time: Saturday, March 10, 6:00 p.m. ET

For more on the two teams, head over to Arizona Wildcats blog Arizona Desert Swarm and Oregon State Beavers blog Building The Dam. For more on the entire tournament, check out Pacific Takes and our Pac-12 Tournament StoryStream.

There was no such thing as home court advantage for UCLA on Thursday. Home court advantage belonged to Arizona’s Solomon Hill, an LA native, who led his team to a 66-58 win in the second round of the Pac-12 tournament.

Hill scored 25 points and added 12 rebounds in the win. He was not the only Arizona player with a double-double. Jesse Perry scored 16 and had 12 rebounds of his own. Hill and Perry combined to sink 24 of 27 free throws to give Arizona an edge.

This is the this first time a No. 9 seed has upset a No. 1 seed in the Pac-12 Tournament.

The game’s full box score can be found here.

The 2012 Pac-12 Tournament continues Thursday at the Staples Center in Los Angeles following a late evening of basketball. It will be another late evening on Thursday with four more games that will stretch into the final minutes of the day on the West Coast (and keep East Coasters up far too late).

Here is the complete schedule for Day 2 of the 2012 Pac-12 Tournament:

Thursday’s game will tip off at noon PT, 3:00 p.m. ET. You can watch the game streamed live via the Pac-12 YouTube page.

For more on Thursday’s game, check out Oregon State blog Building The Dam and Washington blog UW Dawg Pound. For all updates on the Pac-12 Tournament, be sure to follow the SB Nation StoryStream.

Neither team found any success shooting from the field: Colorado hit just 34.9 percent of its shots and Utah 35.9. Both teams took a large number of three-point shots, hitting 5 of 27. This resulted in 58 total rebounds in the game. Utah also had trouble controlling the ball, committing 18 turnovers to Colorado’s nine.

For updates and full coverage of the 2012 Pac-12 Tournament, stay tuned to this StoryStream. For updates and perspective on the Colorado Buffaloes, check out The Ralphie Report. For news and information regarding the Utah Utes, head on over to Block U. For more on the Pac-12 Tournament, be sure to visit SB Nation’s Pacific Takes.

USC shot just 28.8 percent from the floor, while UCLA shot 33.9 percent. The Bruins were better in all facets of the game, though that’s not saying a whole lot when compared to the No. 12-seeded Trojans, who won just one Pac-12 game this season. UCLA recorded six blocks and seven steals, while winning the rebounding battle 38 to 29.

For updates and coverage, stay tuned to this StoryStream. For more on the Pac-12 Tournament, be sure to visit SB Nation’s Pacific Takes. For more on the two teams, head over to UCLA Bruins blog Bruins Nation and USC Trojans blog Conquest Chronicles.

The 2012 Pac-12 Tournament will begin in earnest on Wednesday, with four games in the opening round. The fifth through 12th seeds in the conference will be competing for a chance at the Pac-12 championship and an automatic berth in the 2012 NCAA Tournament.

Here’s Wednesday’s schedule of games. All times are Pacific.