NEWARK, N.J. — With an NCAA Tournament-record 25 3-pointers, Alabama earned a trip to the Elite Eight for the second consecutive season as Mark Sears scored 34 points and the Crimson Tide beat sixth-seeded BYU 113-88 in the East Regional semifinals on Thursday night.
The second-seeded Tide (28-8) will try to reach the Final Four for the second straight season on Saturday night against the winner of top-seeded Duke and fourth-seeded Arizona. Alabama finished 51 attempts from 3, which also set a tournament record.
Alabama had reached the Elite Eight once (2004) — and never made a Final Four — before coach Nate Oats’ team broke through last season. That run ended in the national semifinals against eventual champion Duke. Now Bama’s back in the round Elite Eight thanks to the best long-range shooting performance in the history of March Madness.
The previous record for 3s in an NCAA game was held by Loyola Marymount, which made 21 in the highest scoring tournament game ever: a 149-115 victory against Michigan in 1990.
With future Cougars star and No. 1 overall recruit AJ Dybantsa in the front row of the BYU section, BYU lost for just the second time since early February.
MARK SEARS HITS HIS 10TH TRIPLE 😱#MarchMadness @AlabamaMBB pic.twitter.com/pK7Pt3DHWJ
— NCAA March Madness (@MarchMadnessMBB) March 28, 2025
The Cougars won the recruiting battle against Bama for the 6-foot-9 Dybantsa, who already has name, image and likeness deals with Nike and Red Bull but couldn’t help the Cougars against the Tide on this night.
The Tide blew open the game and broke the 3-point record by knocking down three in a span of about 50 seconds in the second half. Sears made the Tide’s 20th 3-pointer to make it 91-70 with 8:32 left. Chris Youngblood tied the Loyola Marymount mark 26 seconds later, and then Sears made another from the left to break it at 7:41 to make it 97-76.
Sears’ 10th 3 came from the right corner at 6:27, and he left the game for good with 4:15 left, one shy of the record of 11 by LMU’s Jeff Fryer in that famous second-round game against the defending champions.
The matchup of two top-10 Kenpom offenses delivered this tournament’s highest scoring game, but BYU (24-9) of the Big 12 went only 6-for-30 from 3, and that was that. BYU did outscore Alabama 50-16 in the paint, and Richie Saunders led the way with 25.
Sears entered the game in a bit of a shooting slump, having gone 1-for-9 from long range in Alabama’s first two tournament games. He broke out quickly, making three of his first four and 5-of-7 in the first half.
When Aiden Sherrell dropped in Alabama’s final 3 with 14 seconds left, it gave the Tide a program NCAA record for points in a game.
Aden Holloway scored 23 and was 6-for-13 from 3-point range for Alabama, the first of seven SEC teams to make the Sweet 16 to advance to the Elite Eight.
(Photo of Latrell Wrightsell Jr., left, and Mark Sears: Robert Deutsch / Imagn Images)
