Tigers Begin 2022 AAC Tournament Friday Night in Quarterfinals

Friday, March 11

Fort Worth, Texas / Dickies Arena

8 p.m.

University of Memphis

UCF

Tickets

Photo by: Zach Wall

Tigers Begin 2022 AAC Tournament Friday Night in Quarterfinals

Mar 09, 2022 | Men's Basketball

2022 AAC Tournament Bracket (PDF)Memphis Game Notes (PDF)UCF Game Notes (PDF)AAC Notes (PDF)

MEMPHIS, Tenn. – The red-hot Memphis Tigers begin postseason play Friday night in the quarterfinals of the 2022 American Athletic Conference Championship in Fort Worth, Texas.

By virtue of earning a first-round bye, the third-seeded Tigers will play at 8 p.m. Friday on ESPNU against the winner of the first round matchup between No. 6 UCF and No. 11 South Florida. This is the second-straight season the Tigers have been the third seed at Dickies Arena.

Memphis enters postseason play winners of 10 of its last 11 games, with the stretch including two wins against nationally ranked AAC regular-season champion Houston. With a win Friday, the Tigers would secure their fifth-straight 20-win season, which would include all four seasons under head coach Penny Hardaway.

The Tigers won 13 AAC games during the regular season, which is their most since joining the conference prior to the 2013-14 campaign. Memphis split two meetings with UCF during the regular season, with each winning on its home court, and the Tigers defeated South Florida last week in Tampa in the season's lone matchup between the two.

Historically in tournament play, the Tigers bested UCF in the 2012 Conference USA semifinals, the 2019 AAC quarterfinals and the 2021 AAC quarterfinals. UCF got the better of the Tigers in the 2017 AAC quarterfinals in Hartford, Conn., 84-54. The Tigers and South Florida have played once in AAC Tournament action, which was a 79-77 Memphis win in the 2018 first round. Memphis was 3-1 against the Bulls in Conference USA Tournament play, including wins in 2000, 2003 and 2005 and a loss in 1999.

With a victory Friday, Memphis would advance to the semifinals of the AAC Tournament Saturday at 4 p.m. on ESPN2. The championship game is scheduled for 2:15 p.m. Sunday on ESPN, and NCAA Tournament bids are awarded later Sunday evening during CBS's Selection Show starting at 5 p.m.

A trip to the NCAA Tournament would be Memphis' first in eight seasons since 2013-14.

GAME DETAILS
No. 3 Memphis Tigers (19-9) vs. No. 6 UCF/No. 11 South Florida
2022 American Athletic Conference Championship Quarterfinals
Friday, March 11, 2022 | 8 p.m. CT
Dickies Arena (14,000); Fort Worth, Texas
Television: ESPNU (John Schriffen, pxp; Perry Clark, analysis; Myron Medcalf, reporter)
Radio: 98.9 THE ROAR OF MEMPHIS (Dave Woloshin, pxp; Matt Dillon, analysis)

BY THE NUMBERS

2013: Memphis' last conference tournament championship, which came in its last season in Conference USA; the Tigers received an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament in 2014 in its last NCAA appearance.
50: Games of postseason experience on the Memphis roster entering this postseason; the roster combined for six games of experience heading into the 2021 postseason.
21:41: Time Memphis has trailed in its last nine wins out of the possible 360:00 of game time; that includes five games it did not trail at all, three straight, and another game it was behind for a total of 20 seconds.
3: Consecutive Tiger big men have earned AAC Freshman of the Year honors (Jalen Duren, 2022; Moussa Cisse, 2021; Precious Achiuwa, 2020).

THE LAST TIME OUT

The Tigers put an emphatic cap on the 2021-22 regular season with a wire-to-wire 75-61 win over No. 14/14 Houston in front of 17,946 raucous fans Sunday morning at FedExForum.
The Tigers have now defeated three ranked teams in the same season for the first time since 2013-14, which was also the last time the Tigers advanced to the NCAA Tournament.
That includes two wins this year over the AAC regular-season champion Cougars.
Tyler Harris led the way with 15 points, hitting 3-of-6 shots from behind the arc.
Landers Nolley II and Lester Quinones each had 11, and Jalen Duren, Alex Lomax and DeAndre Williams all scored eight apiece.
Duren also grabbed eight rebounds, five offensive.
Lomax had a season-high five steals in his 28 minutes of action.
The Tigers forced 20 Houston turnovers, which is its season high.
Memphis turned the Cougars over 19 times in Houston earlier this season, which was its previous high.
Those turnovers led to 28 Memphis points Sunday.
Memphis jumped all over the Cougars from the onset as the crowd was electric, leading by 10 after just five minutes of game action and by as many as 23 points in the opening 20 minutes.
The Tigers led 49-29 at the break.
Houston pulled within 13 with 12:23 to go in the game after an 8-0 run, but the Tigers quickly responded with a 9-0 burst of their own to reclaim control and open a 22-point lead.
Houston was no closer than 13 points again the rest of the way.
The Cougars were led by Kyler Edwards' 19 points.
Memphis shot 48.1 percent from the field as a team (26-54) and 46.7 percent from 3-point range (7-15).
The Tigers outrebounded Houston, 32-25.

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