MINNEAPOLIS — Virginia, the only top seed remaining, will face Auburn, which is making its first appearance in the Final Four, in the first of two national semifinals of the N.C.A.A. men’s basketball tournament on Saturday. Michigan State, the 2000 champion, plays the newcomer Texas Tech in the second game.

No. 1 Virginia (33-3) vs. No. 5 Auburn (30-9), 6:09 p.m.

No team is hotter than Auburn, which arrives at its first Final Four with a 12-game winning streak: four to end the regular season, four to win the Southeastern Conference tournament and four more in the N.C.A.A. tournament. (The Tigers could become only the second national champion, after Connecticut in 2011, to play 41 games.)

Bruce Pearl’s Tigers have done it by being among the best 3-point-shooting teams and by getting more of their points off 3-pointers than all but six teams in Division I. For that reason, the Tigers’ most impressive win was over second-seeded Kentucky in the regional final, precisely because they could barely buy a 3, going 7-for-23 from beyond the arc. They also won that day without their best big man, Chuma Okeke, who had sustained a season-ending knee injury a game earlier.

Sounds like a tough out, right?

Well. Virginia has the third-best 3-point defense in the country, even as its excellent offense, led by the wings Kyle Guy, Ty Jerome and De’Andre Hunter, and its Tony Bennett-branded, dead-last pace make maximizing points per possession against it essential.