PORTLAND, Ore. — Matas Vokietaitis had 23 points and a career-high 16 rebounds, Tramon Mark added 19 points and four clinching free throws, and 11th-seeded Texas won its second NCAA Tournament game in four days with a 79-71 victory over No. 6 BYU in the West Region on Thursday.
Dailyn Swain had 14 points and Jordan Pope had 11 for Longhorns (20-14), who overcame a 35-point, 10-rebound performance by Cougars freshman AJ Dybantsa in what might have been his final college game.
Dybantsa, a projected No. 1 overall pick in the 2026 NBA Draft if he leaves school, was 11 of 25 from the field and made all 12 of his free-throw attempts.
Texas took a 68-51 lead with 11 minutes remaining when Dybantsa was called for goaltending on Mark’s layup. Then Dybantsa took over.
He had started a run of 15 straight points for BYU (23-12) with a dunk at the 13-minute mark. Dybantsa scored all of the Cougars’ points in a 13-2 run when they closed to 70-64 with 4:08 left.
Vokietaitis followed his own miss for a 72-64 lead before Robert Wright III’s layup closed it to 72-68 with 2:07 left. Pope’s 3-pointer pushed the Longhorns’ lead to seven with 1:29 left.
Aleksej Kostic’s 3-pointer brought BYU within 75-71 with 1:17 remaining, and the Longhorns could not build a cushion when the Cougars were forced to foul.
Vokietaitis missed all seven of his free-throw attempts in the second half, including the front end of three one-and-ones in the final 3 1/2 minutes. His two misses with 31 seconds remaining kept it at 75-71.
But Vokietaitis blocked Wright’s drive with 23 seconds left, and Texas closed out with four Mark free throws.
The Cougars had no early answer for 7-foot Vokietaitis, who had 15 points and 11 rebounds at half, including seven offensive rebounds. He finished with nine offensive boards.
The Longhorns had a 40-31 rebounding edge for the game. They were plus-12 on the boards in the 60-66 victory over North Carolina State in Dayton on Tuesday in the First Four.
They did not land in Portland until about 6 a.m. local time Wednesday.
–Jack Magruder, Field Level Media
