I know I shouldn’t make fun of Vitale after his successful nomination into the basketball hall of fame….but Steve Lavin shocked me. Vitale? ACC bias? Psssssshhh..
What a spectacular game….in which I just happened to say it would go to OT and Kansas would win. The Jayhawks rallied from 9 down in the final 2:12 of regulation, and were aided by missed free throws by Memphis and then Mario Chalmers hit the shot of the tournament:
Kansas did not look back in OT and won 75-68 to win their 1st title since 1988, when Danny Manning and the Miracles beat Oklahoma 83-79.
Everyone will be talking about the Chalmers shot, but the REAL key play of the game was not Memphis’ horrible free throw shooting down the stretch, not Dorsey fouling out, but the steal by Sherron Collins and the three he hit afterwards to cut it to 60-56. Just like that Kansas had 5 quick points (they scored on their previous possession).
Now we talk about free throws. Memphis missed 4 of 5 in regulation, but again, you have to look at Kansas’ numbers. They hit their last 13 free throws of the game, including the two by Collins to seal the deal with 12.8 left. That was completely Memphis’ game to lose, and now they’ll be remembered as the team that couldn’t finish off a wounded side in the Jayhawks.
The game itself was a classic, everything you could imagine, last second game tying shots, missed FTs, clutch FTs, and it probably saved what was a pretty stale tournament after the 2nd round. Derrick Rose’s bank shot could’ve been the dagger, but Kansas never gave up, and both of these team’s fought to the last second playing at a frenetic pace that set us up for a thrilling finish.
Talk about monkey off the back of Bill Self. In his first three years with Kansas they flopped in the first round in huge upsets to Bucknell and Bradley, and then fell to Ben Howland’s UCLA team in the Elite 8 of 2007. Now he’s gotten over the hump, and he did what Roy Williams couldn’t do, and that was win a national championship with Kansas.
Finally, I’m disappointed in CBS for not only letting Jim Nantz (who did a good job calling the game) do the player intros with almost no excitement in his voice, but keeping Greg Gumbel and company stuck in the New York studio, instead of being on site. I don’t know if there were budget cuts but seriously, that’s cheap. They normally do a good job of tournament coverage, but for some reason or the other they fell apart this year.
Congratulations to the Kansas Jayhawks for their memorable win and hopefully the women’s NCAA Championship is just as good tonight(I’m picking Tennessee in a 64-51 romp over Stanford).
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