Saint Peter’s became the first 15th seed to reach the Elite Eight in NCAA Championship history

CNN
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It’s possible that before this month, many sports fans hadn’t heard of St. Peter’s University, a university in Jersey City, New Jersey, with a score of 2,637.

All that changes now if you’ve been watching the NCAA Men’s Championship. Saint Peter’s men’s basketball team made history by being the No. 15 seeded first to reach the Elite Eight, as they beat No. 3 seed Purdue Boilermakers 67-64 in Philadelphia Friday night.

Goalkeeper Doug Eddert said the fans had brought up the team.

“We had a big crowd today,” Edert said. “The whole environment was unreal. I don’t think any of us were nervous or really concerned with how many people were watching us. We just went in there and did our job. We were doing what we’ve been doing all season, which is defend and play as hard as we can. Then the feelings at the end. Once again, we are making history and looking forward to making more history.”

Peacock, the third seed No. 15 to advance to the Sweet 16 in history, will face North Carolina in the Elite Eight on Sunday after defeating the Tar Heels UCLA 73-66.

This is St. Peter’s fourth appearance in the NCAA overall.

After nearly a month between games from December 18 to January 14, due to the Covid-19 outbreak on campus, SPU 18-5 went on calendar year 2022 to win the MAAC title and advance to the Sweet 16 for the first time in the program’s history.

Coach Shaheen Holloway said the break helped the team.

“It was all for us,” Holloway said. “We had a chance to have such a little camp. We haven’t played in 28 days so they had a chance to go out there. Things weren’t going well in the first half of the season. It gave me a chance to really change some things, to come back and watch movies and go back to The drawing board. The break was everything to us.”

St. Peter broke many arches in the round of 64 last week when the Peacocks Kentucky ranked No. 2 surprised. Then they upset number 7 seed Murray State in the round of 32.

The opportunity for 15 manufacturers to qualify began in 1986, when the national championship was first expanded to include 64 teams.