Utah Works Overtime(s) on Image : West: Utes get 29 points from Grant to beat Michigan State, 85-84, and advance to game against Nevada Las Vegas.

TUCSON, Ariz. —  Utah continues to prove the skeptics wrong.

Josh Grant scored a season-high 29 points and the Utes overcame frigid free-throw shooting to beat Michigan State, 85-84, in double overtime Sunday at the West Regional. The victory sends Utah to the final 16 of the NCAA tournament for the first time since 1983.

Although the Utes are 30-3 and ranked 10th in the nation, a lot of people didn’t think they would get this far.

“We feel we’ve been underrated all year. This kind of validates the season,” said Utah Coach Rick Majerus. “Thirty wins is a lot of wins.”

Utah won despite making only 28 of 46 free throws.

“We had a lot of adversity today missing foul shots, but we just played through it,” Majerus said. “That’s what the NCAA tournament is all about. We left it all on the floor today. It’s the best game I’ve ever been involved with in my life.”

The fourth-seeded Utes will play UNLV, a 62-54 winner over Georgetown, on Thursday in the regional semifinals at Seattle.

Fifth-seeded Michigan State (19-11) was led by Steve Smith’s 28 points.

“I thought maybe we earned the game as hard as we played, but Utah probably feels the same way,” Spartan Coach Jud Heathcote said. “It was a great basketball game because there were so many great plays.”

Michigan State forced the first overtime at 64-64 on Matt Steigenga’s driving layup and Smith’s two free throws with 24 seconds left. Smith was fouled away from the ball while Steigenga was shooting.

With Michigan State trailing, 75-73, in the first overtime, the Spartans’ Mike Peplowski was fouled underneath with 6.6 seconds left. After missing his first free throw, Peplowski intentionally missed the second. Teammate Jon Zulauf grabbed the rebound and made a short jumper with four seconds remaining to force the second overtime.

Walter Watts, who scored 14 points, put Utah ahead to stay at 81-79 on a dunk with 1:34 left in the second overtime. A free throw by Watts with 10 seconds left gave Utah an 85-81 lead, giving the Utes enough cushion to withstand Smith’s 3-pointer with three seconds remaining.

Michigan State beat Wisconsin-Green Bay 60-58 in the first round on Smith’s 20-foot jumper at the buzzer.

“We didn’t want Smith to beat us,” Majerus said. “We talked about it ad nauseam before the game. We threw everything at him and he still got his points.”

Jimmy Soto scored 16 points for Utah. Grant, whose previous high was 25 on Dec. 15 against Pacific, had 15 in the first half.

“The way things were going, we thought there might be five or six overtimes,” Grant said. “But we kept our poise and pulled out the win.”

Steigenga, who fouled out in the second overtime, scored 17 points for the Spartans, who led 33-29 at halftime.

“We battled back twice from four points down in regulation and two points in the first overtime. I thought maybe fate was with us,” Heathcote said. “But I never thought we had it won or Utah had it until it was over.”