By Jim O'Connell
The Associated Press

The 65th Final Four will have one No. 1 seed, one team back for a second straight year and two schools from the same conference for a fifth straight season.

Texas was the only top seed to make it through its bracket, beating Michigan State 85-76 Sunday to get the Longhorns in the Final Four for the first time since 1947.

This will be the ninth time since seeding started in 1979 that only one No. 1 made it through. The last time only one No. 1 seed made the Final Four was 2000, when top-seeded Michigan State won the national title.

Second-seeded Kansas eliminated Arizona, the other No. 1 seed, 78-75 on Saturday.

The presence of the Jayhawks, who lost in the national semifinals last season, makes it the fourth straight year a team has made consecutive appearances in the Final Four. The streak of repeaters started with Michigan State, which was in the Final Four from 1999 to 2001 and continued with Maryland in 2001 and 2002.

Both the Longhorns and the Jayhawks are from the Big 12, meaning every Final Four since 1999 has had half the field from one conference. The conference run started in 1999 with Michigan State and Ohio State of the Big Ten and continued with Michigan State and Wisconsin in 2000, Duke and Maryland of the Atlantic Coast Conference in 2001 and Kansas and Oklahoma last season.

Syracuse, which beat top-seeded Oklahoma 63-47 Sunday to win the East Regional, is back in for the first time since 1996 and the third time under coach Jim Boeheim.

The third-seeded Orangemen's other appearance in New Orleans was in 1987 when they lost to Indiana on a jumper by Keith Smart in the final seconds.

Third-seeded Marquette, which stunned top-ranked and top-seeded Kentucky in the Midwest Regional on Saturday, is in the Final Four for the first time since the then-Warriors won it all in 1977 in the last game for coach Al McGuire.

Each team will arrive with a star player. Up front there will be Kansas' Nick Collison and Syracuse freshman Carmelo Anthony, while Marquette's Dwyane Wade and Texas' T.J. Ford are two of the country's best guards.

This will be Kansas coach Roy Williams' fourth Final Four, one more than Boeheim. Marquette's Tom Crean and Texas' Rick Barnes will both be Final Four rookies.

Both of Sunday's winners enjoyed a little home cooking as Syracuse won in Albany, N.Y., about 2 1/2 hours from its campus, while Texas won in San Antonio, about 70 miles from school.

The matchups next Saturday have Marquette against Kansas and Texas against Syracuse.

The winners play Monday night for the national championship, something none of these coaches has won.