DES MOINES, Iowa
Maybe the Big 12 is turning the corner.
After a miserable start to the NCAA Tournament, a 3-4 record by seven teams with better seeds than their opponents, the league came away with two resounding victories on Saturday and has a chance to take a three-game winning streak into the Sweet 16 next week.
Iowa State got things started with a runaway 78-61 victory over Arkansas-Little Rock in Denver, a game that played well to the Cyclones fans who were taking in the action at Wells Fargo Arena. In the concourse, fans from Kansas, Indiana, Kentucky and Connecticut had to maneuver around the Iowa State fans clustered around television monitors.