Scoring Preliminary Round/First Four: Tanner Almost Breaks Mark - Not Kiss

There is a tendency to shun March Madness preliminary-round games and gear up for real 64-team bracket later in the week. But anything could happen when the nation's leading scorer is involved (Bryant's Peter Kiss against Wright State). Kiss, scoring at least 30 points in 10 games this season, tallied more than his 25 ppg but Tanner Holden had the Wright stuff and outscored him, 37-28, to highlight match-ups eliminating four "non-essential" entrants.

The "qualifying" round typically featured "last four in" teams or members of automatic-qualification leagues that probably shouldn't be designated NCAA Division I. For instance, the only year a HBCU didn't participate in the first 21 preliminary-round (1983, 1984 and 2001 through 2010) or First Four (since 2011) competition was 2001 when Northwestern State beat Winthrop. Texas Southern's Aaric Murray, the only HBCU player to crack 30-point plateau in the NCAA DI Tournament, shares high-scoring honors at this "prelim" level with Princeton's Kevin Mullin (38 points). Holden fell one basket shy of setting a new preliminary-round mark, but joined the following chronological list of authentic "One Shining Moment" scoring performances by seven players manufacturing more than 30 points in a preliminary-round game or First Four assignment:

Year	Player	School	Points	Preliminary Round/First Four Foe
1984	Kevin Mullin	Princeton	38	defeated San Diego (65-56)
2002	Prosper Karangwa	Siena	31	defeated Alcorn State (81-77)
2007	Clif Brown	Niagara	32	defeated Florida A&M (77-69)
2014	Aaric Murray	Texas Southern	38	lost against Cal Poly (81-69)
2015	Tyler Haws	Brigham Young	33	lost against Mississippi (94-90)
2019	Darnell Edge	Fairleigh Dickinson	33	defeated Prairie View (82-76)
2022	Holden Tanner	Wright State	37	defeated Bryant (93-82)

NOTE: District "play-in" games were conducted from 1939 through 1942 and 1947 through 1950. The highest-scoring game was in 1948 when Baylor beat Arizona, 65-59.