ARKANSAS DELIVERS

Corey Beck, the Arkansas guard, sat off by himself. Only 7 minutes 57 seconds remained in this Midwest Regional final, and once again his team found itself in a steel-cage match, this time with Virginia. The Cavs, tougher than a trip to the dentist, trailed here by only two, and that is why Corey Beck was sitting off by himself and thinking. “Get your act together,” he was thinking.

His teammates were to his left, gathered around Nolan Richardson during this timeout, and they were listening to their coach give some orders of his own. “We’re going to pressure full-court,” he was ordering, and then he sent out a patchwork lineup that did not include his combative point guard.

But now Richardson wandered over to Beck, who was saddled with four fouls. “We’re going to pick up our defense. So get plenty of rest for when I send you back in,” he told him.

“We,” Beck said later, “basically wanted to go back to 40 minutes of hell. That’s what we did then.”

That is exactly what the Hogs did then, hit the Cavs with perfervid pressure, and that is exactly what drove the defending national champions to their 68-61 win and to a Final Four meeting next Saturday in Seattle with North Carolina. For 7 minutes here they resembled the threshing machine they were a spring ago, creating chaos, challening shots, causing turnovers, finally unnerving an opponent that until now had performed with poise and aplomb.

They had, until now, choreographed this affair, that is what the Cavaliers had done, and until now it had been played out at that slow, torturous pace they so desired. But up 45-43, Arkansas would change that, coming out of the timeout and going on the attack. “We,” Scotty Thurman would say, “just felt they hadn’t seen the kind of pressure we could apply. We felt if we got them doing something different, they’d start rushing shots.”

Virginia would indeed start rushing its shots, and everything else as well, and inexorably, with a force they’ve exhibited only rarely this season, the Hogs grabbed this one by the throat. Virginia was held to two field goals and two free throws in the next 6 minutes, and as all the Cavs wilted, there were Arkansas’ brightest stars frolicking on center stage.

There was Corliss Williamson, who would end with 21 points, with a power move down low, and then three free throws. Now there was Thurman, who would end with 17, with a huge three-pointer, and finally there was Williamson again, first with a pass to a wide-open Beck for a layup, then with a pass to Clint McDaniel that resulted in two McDaniel free throws for a 58-49 lead with 3:03 left.

Sixteen seconds later there was McDaniel tipping the ball away from Cavs guard Harold Deane, and Beck collecting it and getting fouled by Deane, and Thurman turning toward the stands and urging his fans to up their volume even louder. Now Williamson was smiling at McDaniel, and Thurman was hugging McDaniel, and they were not celebrating too early, this one was clearly theirs.

“It was,” Williamson said, “one of the few games we played tough defense at the end of the game.”

“We,” said Richardson, “looked like the Razorbacks of yesteryear. We got on a roll and our defense took over the game. Scotty Thurman was shooting from the ozone. Then, when things were really bad, we go to the Deliverer, Big Nasty (Williamson), and he sure delivers.”

Virginia, in the first half, shot 29.2 percent, and went 8 1/2 minutes without a field goal. Arkansas, in the first half, shot 37.9 percent, and got not a point from starters Beck, McDaniel and Elmer Martin.

This is just what Virginia wanted, a meat grinder of a game, but Arkansas’ defense would do the final grinding. It held the Cavs to 33.9 percent shooting. It was dented by Junior Burrough for 22 points, but harassed guards Deane and Curtis Staples to score a field goal.

It was, simply, a performance that resembled many Arkansas put on a year ago, and when it closed, there its players were in the middle of the court, dancing, celebrating, singing out words that could well serve as a fair warning to those three others who will be joining the Hogs in Seattle. “Are you ready for the show? It’s Showtime,” they were singing.