Terps drop final ACC tourney game

Maryland’s last trip to the ACC Tournament wasn’t a pleasant one.

Ian Miller scored 17 points to lead No. 9 seed Florida State past the eighth-seeded Terps 67-65 in a second-round game.

Maryland (17-15) will head to the Big 10 next season having gone 45-56 in the ACC’s annual tournament since appearing in its first one in 1954, according to umterps.com. Aaron Thomas also scored 14 points and Boris Bojanovsky added 12 for the Seminoles (19-12), who won for the first time in five conference tournament meetings with Maryland.

Seth Allen and Dez Wells each scored 18 points to lead Maryland.

Big East: Seton Hall 64, Villanova 63

Villanova’s stay in the Big East Tournament didn’t last long at all. Sterling Gibbs hit a jumper at the buzzer as No. 8 seed Seton Hall stunned top seed and Associated Press No. 3 Villanova in the quarterfinals of the Big East Tournament at Madison Square Garden.

Villanova (28-4), which was vying for a No. 1 seed in the NCAA Tournament now will have to hope its regular season body of work, which included wins in 12 of its last 13 games, is good enough. Meanwhile, Seton Hall picked up a one-point victory for the second consecutive day after nipping ninth-seeded Butler 51-50 in Wednesday’s opening round.

Eugene Teague had 19 points and 12 rebounds to lead the Pirates (17-16)

Josh Hart had 18 points to lead Villanova, which went winless in the Big East Tournament for the first time since dropping a first round game to South Florida in 2011.

Big Ten: Illinois 64, Indiana 54

Tracy Abrams scored a season-high 25 points in the Illini’s first-round win in Indianapolis.

Abrams, who had a combined nine points in his previous two games, hit 8 of 16 field goals and the Illinois (19-13) defense forced 16 turnovers in winning for the fifth time in six games. The one loss during that stretch was a 31-point humbling March 4 at home against regular season champion Michigan, which the ninth-seeded Illini play in today’s quarterfinals.

Indiana (17-15), which tied a season-high with its third consecutive defeat, was paced by Yogi Ferrell’s 14 points.

American: Houston 68, SMU 64

Jherrod Stiggers scored 19 points off the bench as the No. 6 seed Cougars pulled the upset over the No. 25 team in the country.

Stiggers hit five of his team’s nine 3-pointers in leading the Cougars to a semifinal meeting with the winner of No. 2 Louisville and seventh-seeded Rutgers.

L.J. Rose added 16 points and hit all three of his 3-pointers for Houston (17-15), which lost both games to the Mustangs in the regular season by a combined 11 points.

SMU (23-9), the No. 3 seed which lost its third straight game, got 14 points from Cannen Cunningham.