DALLAS — DJ Horne scored 19 points and North Carolina State kept its magical NCAA Tournament run alive, beating Marquette 67-58 on Friday night to reach the Elite Eight for the first time since 1986.

Casey Morsell added 15 points and Mohamed Diarra had 11 points and 15 rebounds for the Wolfpack, who have eight consecutive victories since the start of the Atlantic Coast Conference Tournament, which they had to win even to be a part of March Madness.

On the 50th anniversary of N.C. State’s first national championship in 1974 – when the Wolfpack beat the Golden Eagles for the title – it’s beginning to look a lot like the second one in 1983.

N.C. State (25-14), the 11th seed in the South Region, will face top-seeded Houston or No. 4 seed Duke on Sunday for a spot in the Final Four.

The last time the Wolfpack went that far 41 years ago, they had to win the ACC Tournament before the late Jim Valvano sprinted around the court trying to find someone to hug after a still-talked-about upset of high-flying Houston for the title.

The lower-key Kevin Keatts is in charge of the latest unlikely crew, with a big personality between the lines in 6-foot-9, 275-pound forward DJ Burns Jr., whose spinning layup and five assists helped the Wolfpack build a 13-point halftime lead.

The No. 2 seed Golden Eagles (27-10) couldn’t overcome an unsightly shooting performance in their first trip to the Sweet 16 since 2013. They went 4 of 31 (12.9%) from 3-point range and shot 33.3% overall.

Kam Jones scored 20 points and point guard Tyler Kolek had 17 points and 10 rebounds as a Big East team lost for the first time in eight games in this tournament.

PURDUE 80, GONZAGA 68: Purdue big man Zach Edey withstood all the abuse Gonzaga could lay on him, finishing with 27 points and 14 rebounds to lift the Boilermakers (32-4) to a victory and move them one win from the Final Four.

Gonzaga (27-8) leaned on, swatted and grabbed at the 7-foot-4 center – even slapped him across the forehead at one point – but it wasn’t enough to stop either him or his top-seeded team.

On Sunday, Purdue, which last year became history’s second first-round loser as a No. 1 seed, will play the winner of Friday’s later game between Tennessee and Creighton in the Midwest Region. A win there would land the program in the Final Four for the first time since 1980.

Braden Smith had 14 points, 15 assists and eight rebounds for the Boilermakers, though this game, like most of them for Purdue (32-4), came down to the other team’s inability to hold down the nation’s leading scorer.

Fifth-seeded Gonzaga gave it a go for 30 minutes, but foul trouble and an ever-shrining basket ended its hopes.

Graham Ike had 18 points and 10 rebounds for Coach Mark Few’s Bulldogs, who shot only 38% over the first 15 minutes of the second half and fell to 0-3 vs. Edey and the Boilermakers over the past two seasons. Like all the Gonzaga big men, Ike spent the evening in foul trouble; he got his fifth and trudged off the court for good with 5:07 left.

ELITE EIGHT: UConn is trying to be the first team to win back-to-back NCAA men’s basketball titles in 17 years – and that’s not all.

With three more March Madness wins, the Huskies could wind up as the last team ever to repeat as champions.

“It’s tough. It’s not easy,” UConn coach Dan Hurley said Friday as his top-seeded Huskies prepared to play No. 3 Illinois for a spot in their second straight Final Four. “It’s going to get tougher.”

Repeating has never been easy, though John Wooden figured it out pretty well at UCLA, winning seven in a row from 1967-73 behind future Hall of Famers like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar — then known as Lew Alcindor — and Bill Walton.

But that was an era when players would stay at one school, unable to leave early for the NBA or easily transfer. Even when Duke repeated in 1991 and ’92 and Florida did it in ’06 and ’07, it was a much different era.

With the advent of the transfer portal and the one-and-done pro prospect — along with name, image and likeness deals that can lure players elsewhere — long-term team-building has largely gone the way of the two-handed set shot.

“Oh, it’s harder. It’s way harder,” Hurley said. “Obviously, you’re managing your roster with the portal, with NIL. You’d better be a more skilled coach these days because you’re dealing with a lot more stuff.

“For us, I think we’ve made it look easy in these past two tournaments,” Hurley said. “But it’s hard.”

UConn beat San Diego State 82-52 in the Sweet 16 on Thursday night in a rematch of last year’s title game, becoming the first defending champions since the 2007 Gators to make it back to the Elite Eight. Even so, this year’s Huskies are much different than last year’s NCAA champions.

Adama Sanogo (Bulls), Jordan Hawkins (Pelicans) and Andre Jackson (Bucks) left for the NBA. Guard Stephon Castle arrived as a freshman through old-fashioned recruiting, and guard Cam Spencer transferred from Rutgers.

“They fit,” Illinois coach Brad Underwood said. “Their staff has done an incredible job of evaluating the guys that fit them.”

The Illini have supplemented a team that lost in the first round of the NCAA Tournament last year and hasn’t been to a regional final since making it to the 2005 championship game.

Forward Marcus Domask transferred from Southern Illinois. Forward Quincy Guerrier spent two seasons apiece at Syracuse and Oregon. Guard Terrence Shannon Jr. spent three years at Texas Tech. Center Dain Dainja came over after a year at Baylor.

They joined forward Coleman Hawkins, who has stuck around in Champaign for four years, and guard Ty Rogers, who is in his second year with the Illini.

SIENA: Gerry McNamara has signed a deal to take over as coach at Siena, deciding to leave Syracuse after two decades as a standout player, assistant and eventually ascending to associate head coach for the Orange.

McNamara’s signing was announced by Siena on Friday and makes him a collegiate head coach for the first time. He replaces Siena alum Carmen Maciariello, who was fired after going 68-72 in five seasons at the school – including a 4-28 mark this season.

McNamara has been on the Syracuse staff since 2009 – first as a graduate assistant, then more than a decade as an assistant under Jim Boeheim and last season he became associate head coach for the Orange when Adrian Autry took over as head coach.

The 40-year-old McNamara remains the fourth-leading scorer in Syracuse history behind only Laurence Moten, Derrick Coleman and John Wallace. He started on Syracuse’s 2003 national championship team that was led by Carmelo Anthony; McNamara had 18 points, all on 3-pointers, in the Orange’s 81-78 win over Kansas in the NCAA title game.

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