Don't expect Paul Pierce to seek out Jason Terry this spring to reflect on NCAA tournament memories from their collegiate playing days.

Pierce and Terry battled as college opponents in the 1997 Sweet 16, with Terry's Arizona Wildcats pulling off a stunning 85-82 upset of Pierce's Kansas Jayhawks, the top-seeded team in the entire tournament. Kansas was the odds-on favorite to win a national championship when it reached the Sweet 16 boasting a 34-1 record and one of the best starting fives -- Pierce, Raef LaFrentz, Jacque Vaughn, Scot Pollard and Jerod Haase -- in Kansas history. Since that time, Piece has cemented his legacy as a Hall-of-Famer, while LaFrentz, Vaughn and Pollard combined to play 34 seasons in the NBA, with both LaFrentz and Pollard having stints with the Celtics. Vaughn now is the coach of the Magic.

On the other hand, fourth-seed Arizona was the underdog after finishing fifth in its own conference -- the Pac-10 -- during the regular season. The Wildcats, who entered the game with a record of 21-9, boasted a backcourt consisting of freshman Mike Bibby and junior Miles Simon. The Wildcats also had a future NBA forward in junior Michael Dickerson, and arguably the top sixth man in the country that season in Terry, a sophomore.

Kansas and Arizona entered that Sweet 16 contest with a bit of history. Kansas had knocked Arizona out of the 1996 West Regional when Pierce and Terry were freshmen. Then-Arizona coach Lute Olson remembers feeling confident in his defensive game plan entering the rematch.

"There was a lot of carryover from that game, and our guys didn't feel like underdogs," Olson told WEEI.com this week. "Pierce was our primary concern. At that point, Vaughn was not a good outside shooter, so we felt we could help off of him. We had two big guys [A.J. Bramlett and Bennett Davison] to cover LaFrentz and Pollard. Pierce was our biggest challenge."

Pierce, who averaged 16.3 points and 6.8 rebounds per game that season as a sophomore, actually was Kansas' second-best player that season behind LaFrentz (18.5 ppg, 9.3 rpg). However, Pierce had caught fire late in the season. He posted 30 points (12-of-18 shooting) and 11 rebounds in Kansas' victory over Missouri in the Big 12 championship. He averaged 19.5 points and 12.5 rebounds in Kansas' first two tournament games. On the season, Pierce hit 46.5 percent of his 3-point attempts.

"Pierce was a great outside shooter," Olson said. "He was also a great penetrator; he could go either way on you. He created a lot of defensive problems. We didn't solve him that night."

Pierce was the best player on the floor for either team, scoring 27 points on 9-of-13 shooting with 11 rebounds. He hit all three of his 3-point attempts and shot 6-of-7 from the free throw line.

"Obviously, you can see what he did to us," Olson said. "He had an outstanding game. We were a team that had to win by putting four guys in double figures. We didn't have a Paul Pierce."

While Pierce raised his game on the biggest stage, his Kansas teammates fell short. LaFrentz finished below his season averages with 14 points and nine rebounds. Vaughn, an All-America point guard, scored four points on 3-of-10 shooting. Pollard was plagued with foul trouble and did not score a point in 20 minutes.

"It's definitely a tough loss for us," Pierce said after the game. "We worked so hard all year to get to this point. Unfortunately, we kind of fell short and are a little bit disappointed, but I'm not going to hold my head down."

Arizona was led by its dynamic backcourt of Bibby and Simon. Bibby finished with 21 points on 7-of-11 shooting and hit two huge free throws in the closing seconds to ice the win. Simon finished with 17 points on 7-of-12 shooting. Dickerson (20 points) and Bramlett (12 points) rounded out Arizona's foursome of double-digit scoring. Terry had a quiet night, scoring five points in 23 minutes. He averaged just 9.2 points per game during Arizona's tournament run that season.

"I wouldn't say Terry had a bad night against Kansas," Olson said. "He was, by a number of publications, the sixth man of the year. He always prided himself on that. He'd come in and really give the team a lift. He was the finisher. In the final 10 minutes of games, he shot over 70 percent for us. He was really a plus performer."

Arizona went on to become the first team in NCAA tournament history to beat three No. 1 seeds en route to a national championship. The Wildcats beat a North Carolina team led by Vince Carter and Antawn Jamison in the Final Four (in what turned out to be Dean Smith's last game as UNC coach), and a Rick Pitino-coached Kentucky team led by Ron Mercer, Derek Anderson and Jamaal Magloire in the championship game.

"We built momentum throughout the tournament, but nobody has us beating Kansas," Olson said. "We were sort of like the team that didn't belong. The key to our club was Miles Simon. He had a lot of confidence. He was able to help Mike Bibby. They were close. As a freshman, Mike's confidence was up and down, but Simon's swagger probably helped. Some thought he was overconfident, but he had a lot in himself, and it rubbed off on other players."

Pierce and Terry are the only players from the Kansas-Arizona 1997 matchup currently playing in the NBA. Pierce's college career came to a close the following March when his top-seeded Jayhawks fell to ninth-seeded Rhode Island, a team led by Cuttino Mobley, in the second round. Terry played two more seasons at Arizona and did not return to the Final Four.

"Facing Pierce, he was as big a challenge then as he is now," Olson said. "He's always had great footwork. He can shoot it. He can penetrate in either direction. At the time we didn't know it, but he was the best player we'd face in that tournament."