March Madness 2022 - Roller Coaster, No Love

Sometimes the championship game ends up being a dud.  That was the case last year when Gonzaga emptied the tank to survive their semifinal matchup with UCLA and had nothing left for the Baylor Bears.  Then there have been the iconic games that came down to a winning shot in the waning seconds, like Michael Jordan's jumper to lead North Carolina over Georgetown or Keith Smart's almost identical shot to lead Indiana over Syracuse.  We've had championships decided by near buzzer-beaters (Gordon Hayward's half-court heave that nearly knocked off Duke) and actual buzzer-beaters (Kris Jenkins nailing a three to elevate Villanova over North Carolina).  But in all of the national championship games I've ever watched, I'm not sure one has ever had as many wild swings as the one that was played on Monday night.  And despite each team trading haymakers for 40 minutes, it still came down to one final shot.

The beginning of this one had a familiar look.  When St. Peter's had run out of gas, they fell behind 9-0 quickly to North Carolina.  Villanova came into the Final Four without one of their key players and found themselves in a 10-0 hole to Kansas before they knew what hit them.  And after an emotional game where they beat their arch rivals and ended the storied career of Coach K, it appeared that North Carolina may have sleepwalked on to the court in this tilt vs. Kansas.  The Jayhawks were full of energy from the opening tip, rushing out to a 7-0 lead as the Tar Heels tried to get their bearings.  Part of the early adversity was physical for North Carolina.  The best player in this year's tournament, double-double machine Armando Bacot, had injured his ankle late in the victory over Duke and he looked to be moving a little gingerly during the first few possessions.  Brady Manek, the only player whose age was also his jersey number, got hit in the head multiple times early in the first half, needing to be checked out for a concussion at one point.  The physical maladies would be a hard luck theme for North Carolina throughout this game.

Despite getting beaten up and starting slow, the Tar Heels were not about to give in.  They scored 12 of the next 16 to grab their first lead.  Over the next few minutes, we would have one of the few periods of level action between the teams as they traded buckets, leading to a deadlocked score of 22 all.  But then came the best in-game sideline interview of all time.  Tracy Wolfson pulled Hubert Davis away from his team for a few moments during a timeout and we got to experience some television magic.  Wolfson barely got her question out before Davis blurted out "IT'S LIVE ACTION!"  And if you think I'm exaggerating by going all caps on that one, you must go find this interview online somewhere.  Davis had gone full Ric Flair and Wolfson just gave up on asking questions and let the Tar Heels coach have his moment.  He must have brought that intensity over to the team for the remainder of the timeout, because they came out playing with that same fervor.  North Carolina would score the next 16 points of the game and suddenly we had gone from "Kansas might run away with this" early on to "Kansas might be done" before we had reached halftime.  The Jayhawks looked completely confused on the offensive end, while North Carolina was getting whatever they wanted when they had the ball.  Even when the Tar Heels missed, it seemed like Bacot was there to get the offensive rebound to keep the possession alive.  Bacot would set a tournament record with his 6th double-double, an accomplishment he would nail down before the half.  When the buzzer sounded to end the first 20 minutes, the score was 40-25 in favor of the Tar Heels.  It would take a historic comeback if Kansas was going to cut down the nets at the end of the night.

Quick tangent: my love for March Madness may have grown over the years because the NBA has become so unwatchable (personal opinion).  Every now and then I'll turn on an NBA game, but it usually isn't very long before I become bored and switch to something else.  There is still one thing I really do enjoy about the NBA though and that is the halftime and post-game show with Kenny Smith and Charles Barkley.  And since TNT and TBS are part of the family of networks that cover March Madness, those two were on the desk for the Final Four.  If you watched the Final Four on Saturday night, you may have heard Chuck guaranteeing a Kansas title before the North Carolina-Duke game even tipped off.  You also might have sensed the dread on Chuck's face as Kenny's alma mater won the second semifinal, meaning he was one game away from having to hear the Jet brag about his team for the next 12 months.  And with Kansas down 15 at the break, Chuck was not shy about critiquing Coach Self's game plan.  "What the hell are they doing?", Chuck asked repeatedly, calling the game plan "dumb".  Kansas needed to pick up the pace and stop running a slow half-court offense through their big man as they had done in their victory against Villanova.  North Carolina didn't have a bunch of little guys like Villanova, so that strategy wasn't gonna work.  Chuck pleaded for the Jayhawks to come out in the second half with the intention to run and gun.  I know that the Tar Heels didn't hear Coach Davis's sideline interview, but it seemed like it had an effect on them.  By the same token, I know the Jayhawks didn't hear Chuck's halftime advice, but you would have thought he gave that speech in their locker room when you saw how the second half started.

The tempo of Kansas's offense went way up after intermission.  They were driving to the hoop with a purpose.  They were boxing out on the defensive end, limiting Bacot's offensive rebounds, and setting up their transition offense.  North Carolina was flat coming out of the locker room.  The Jayhawks kept chipping away at the lead.  Then it was tied.  Then they had the lead.  Soon after Kansas went on top, they stole the ball and got an easy three-point play to extend their advantage to 6.  The Tar Heels were getting a standing 8 count and showing little indication that they could keep going in this fight.  It was a 31-10 run to open the half and Kansas led 56-50.

After a timeout, North Carolina returned to the court bloodied but not beaten, although there was more physical adversity on the way for them.  Their top shooter, Caleb Love, would twist his ankle while cutting to the hoop and looked unable to run at full speed, but Kansas would not be able to take advantage.  Instead, the Tar Heels looked to other options for scoring.  First, it was RJ Davis.  Then it was the Puff Johnson show.  The Carolina reserve who hadn't logged a lot of minutes played like a man possessed.  And then all of a sudden he looked like he had the fitness of that 7'3" dude from Purdue.  After a frantic sequence where both teams sprinted up and down the court trading baskets, Kansas's Ochai Agbaji pointed towards a stricken Puff Johnson and the refs stopped the game.  Johnson was on his knees vomiting on the court.  He reached at his chest a couple of times, which raised alarm bells that something more serious might be happening, but it turned out that the pace of play combined with a shot to the stomach led to Johnson's One Nauseous Moment.  Once again, the Tar Heels would have to change course in order to keep their national championship hopes alive.

With the game tied at 65 and about three minutes to go, the teams kept trading blows.  A Remy Martin three put Kansas up 68-65, but North Carolina responded with a layup and a tip-in on an offensive rebound to lead by 1.  The Jayhawks would miss on the other end, but convert on an offensive rebound of their own to move back in front.  And then came the final, most cruel injury to the Tar Heels.  Down 1, they trusted their fate in Armando Bacot.  He made a move to the hoop, but collapsed to the floor as his ankle, which had held up for 39 minutes of game time, finally gave out.  Kansas snapped up the loose ball and could have taken advantage of a 5-on-4 situation, but they were more interested in running clock than taking a 3 point lead.  As a result, Bacot had time to hop down the floor on one leg, where officials were finally able to call a timeout to address his injury.  With Bacot out of the game, Kansas smartly dumped the ball back inside as the Bacot-less Tar Heels had become Villanova-esque.  Jayhawk big man David McCormack rose up and hit a short jumper with 22 seconds left to put Kansas up 3.

North Carolina came down the court with every intent to tie the game with a 3 and you knew who would be shooting it.  Caleb Love got the ball and launched from beyond the arc, but he couldn't convert this time.  Another offensive rebound for the Tar Heels led to a Puff Johnson attempt from downtown, but his shot missed and the ball went out of bounds to Kansas with less than 5 seconds to play.  That seemed like the clincher.  The Jayhawks just needed to get the ball inbounds, have North Carolina foul them, and make their free throws.  Even if they missed the 1-and-1, the Tar Heels would be hard pressed to tie the game in less than 4 seconds.  Kansas would likely foul them before they could attempt a game-tying three.

But in a game full of wild swings, there were more unexpected plays to be had, even in those last 5 seconds.  Kansas was able to inbound the ball, but DaJuan Harris Jr. inexplicably ran out of bounds as soon as he caught it, not only turning the ball over with almost no time coming off the clock, but giving the Tar Heels the ball down at their offensive end of the court.  It was "Chris Webber calling a timeout he didn't have"-level dumb.  That being said, the Tar Heels were still up against it.  There was simply no way that Kansas was going to let them get off a tying three.  Even with a foul, North Carolina would have to make the first free throw, intentionally miss the second, get an offensive rebound without the guy who snagged all of their rebounds for them, and then score within 4 seconds.  And Kansas wasn't going to make two boneheaded plays in a row with the title on the line.  Right?  RIGHT?!?!

Somehow they did.  Not only did the Jayhawks not foul, they let the Tar Heels inbound the ball to their best shooter, Caleb Love, who would get an opportunity at one more magical shot for his tournament highlight reel, this one to send the national championship to overtime.  He didn't get the cleanest look and his final prayer would find nothing but air.  Kansas did everything they could to blow this one late, but the Jayhawks are your new national champions, outlasting a gritty North Carolina squad by a score of 72-69.

And with that result, I am happy to announce the winners of this year's pools.  Only one bracket had the Jayhawks winning it all, and with that result, Yarmela is the champion of the 2022 Main Pool.  Vince takes the runner-up spot, while Chubbs takes 3rd.  There were no brackets with Kansas on top in the Gamblers Pool, so Vince grabs top honors there.  The only thing to decide was who would be second: Tiny or Dwight?  Tiny went with a total final score of 140 in the championship game.  Dwight went slightly higher with a guess of 142.  And because the Madness never disappoints, we had a total score of 141, resulting in our first ever tie.  All results from this year's pool can be found here.

That's it for this year's March Madness.  I hope you stuck around for One Shining Moment, which was awesome as always.  The Indiana cheerleader, the crying Tennessee player, and the St. Peter's Peacocks were prominently featured.  Because of all the Coach K stuff on Saturday night, I forgot to predict that there would be a lot of him in the montage, but there deservedly was.  The only miss was the shirtless Kelvin Sampson celebration.  For some reason, other tamer locker room celebrations were shown.  Boooo!

Thanks to everyone for playing!  Wishing you and your families a happy and healthy 2022!

March Madness 2022 - Ca-ro-li-na, Ca-ro-li-na, Coach K-hey, good-bye

It is pretty rare that we get to the Championship game and still have things to decide in both pools, but that will be the case this year.  In the Main Pool, Yarmela will be rooting for Kansas to cut down the nets and elevate her to the top spot, but if they lose, Vince will win both pools.  That is because Vince is the newest champ of the Gamblers Pool.  A tiebreaker will be needed to decide second and third place.  If the total score is less than 141, Tiny is the runner up.  A total score over 141 points gives Dwight the silver medal.  The standings can be found here.

In our first national semifinal, we had an undersized team from the Northeast wearing dark blue uniforms that fell way behind quickly.  Did the St. Peter's Peacocks crash the Final Four?  Nope, it was actually the Villanova Wildcats who found themselves down 10-0 in the first two and a half minutes of the game.  It would actually get worse from there as Kansas took a 38-19 lead with five minutes to go in the first half.  Was there a Jayhawk with a huge number of rebounds that I could follow in the second half?  This eerily felt like North Carolina - St. Peter's part two, except Villanova wasn't a 15 seed.

The Wildcats championship fight was on display from that moment forward though.  Villanova would score the next 10 points to trim the lead to single digits.  The deficit would be 11 at the break, but at least the Wildcats had planted a seed of doubt in the heads of the Kansas players that this thing wasn't over.  Even when the Jayhawks extended the lead to 16 early in the second half, Jay Wright's players let it be known that they would not be sent packing quietly.  They kept scrapping and chipping away, getting within 6 with more than six minutes left to play.  But that would end up being as close as they would get.  The dagger would come with 4 minutes to go.  Kansas was up 9 and the shot clock was about to hit zero when Christian Braun nailed a three to effectively clinch the Jayhawks spot in Monday's title game.  Kansas was probably the least heralded of the #1 seeds coming into the tournament, but they'll be the ones playing for it all.  The Jayhawks defeat a resilient Villanova squad by a score of 81-65.

National semifinal #2 was the marquee matchup because it featured the sport's biggest rivalry on a stage they had never played on before.  Duke and North Carolina is typically must see TV, but they had never met in the NCAA tournament, much less the Final Four.  And with this being Coach K's final season, there was somehow one more layer of intrigue added to this game.  Duke was seeking revenge as the Tar Heels had ruined Coach K's last home game by blowing them out in Durham a few weeks ago.  Duke had been the most clutch team in the tournament so far, while an argument could be made that North Carolina had been the most impressive through 4 rounds.  Something would have to give and this game would not disappoint in terms of drama.

It was back and forth from the opening tip, but North Carolina looked like they might have an early advantage when the ref's whistle kept going against Duke in the beginning of the game.  The Blue Devils would be called for the first 6 fouls in this one, including 2 against their best big man, Mark Williams.  That would land him on the bench for the rest of the half.  His replacement, Theo John, would remarkably pick up 4 fouls before intermission, something you almost never see in college basketball.  Despite encountering some incredibly rare foul trouble, Duke managed to lead after 20 minutes by a score of 37-34.

The second half would be even more frantic.  As was the case with Duke's game with Texas Tech, the Blue Devils emerged from the locker room displaying much more aggression than they had in the opening half, extending their lead to 7.  But North Carolina would respond with the biggest run of the night.  The Tar Heels scored the next 13 points to leap ahead by 6.  There wouldn't be much separation the rest of the way.  During the last 7 minutes of this contest, there would be 10 lead changes.  Both squads seemed determined not to let their season end at the hands of their hated rival.  A three on one end would be answered by a trey from the other team.  It became a matter of who would blink first.  And the blink wouldn't happen on a missed three or a blocked layup.  It would actually happen at the foul line.

With Duke up 1 and just over a minute to go, Carolina's RJ Davis drove to the hoop and was fouled.  He stepped to the line and calmly sank two free throws.  In this seemingly never ending game of tit-for-tat, it only made sense that Duke would get fouled on a drive to the hoop.  The Blue Devils had a chance to take the lead, and perhaps most importantly, it had eliminated one of North Carolina's key players from the game.  Armando Bacot had more than 20 rebounds for the second consecutive game, even shrugging off a rolled ankle that had occurred with about 5 minutes to go.  But the rules say you can't shrug off your 5th personal foul, so Bacot had to take a seat.  If this game went to overtime, the Tar Heels were going to have their hands full defending Duke's big men and getting rebounds without Bacot.  To the free throw stepped Mark Williams, and he would be the one who blinked.  The first free throw was long, the second free throw short.  North Carolina had possession of the ball, a 1 point lead, and only 47 seconds remained.

Many teams would run down as much of the 30 second shot clock as they could in this situation, eventually leaving themselves with a horrible forced shot, but the Tar Heels played it smart.  They certainly didn't rush into their offense, but when their best shooter, Caleb Love, found some space at the top of the key, he didn't hesitate to hoist up a three.  And it was pure.  Carolina was up 4 with less than 28 seconds to go and Duke had no timeouts.  Suddenly, you could sense that Duke was in huge trouble.  To their credit, they rushed down the court and got an easy drive to the hoop to bring the deficit back down to 2, but they would be forced to put Love on the line.  Love made the first, but he missed the second, suddenly giving Duke life again.  As the Blue Devils ran their offense to set up a game tying three, North Carolina accidentally fouled them.  How do I know it was an accident?  Because it almost resulted in a three-point play that could have tied the game.  Trevor Keels went to the line and sank the first, missed the second.  Was the miss intentional?  Nope.  How do I know?  Because there was no one in the neighborhood of the rebound.  Each team had made the first free throw, missed the second, and tit-for-tat had officially been restored with the two missed free throws by Williams being the only blip along the way.  That was one extremely costly blip though.  Love would get sent to the line again and he wouldn't miss this time, putting North Carolina up 4 with only 8 seconds left.  Duke would miss one final three pointer and that was it.  I've never known college basketball without Coach K, but one of the greatest coaching eras in sports has now come to a close.  North Carolina moves on to play Kansas for the title after ousting the team they (and many others) hate the most.  The Tar Heels defeat Duke by a score of 81-77.

One game left and the focus will shift from Coach K to Roy Williams, who isn't coaching either of the teams in the title game, but he had long stints with each of them (15 years with Kansas, 18 years with North Carolina).  Prepare for lots of shots of him in the stands where he will most definitely be clad in Carolina powder blue (where he won three titles).  It should be an excellent national championship game followed by a wonderful One Shining Moment featuring a shirtless Kelvin Sampson celebrating, the crying Tennessee player being comforted by Juwan Howard, lots of St. Peter's highlights, and the cheerleaders who were able to get the basketballs stuck above the backboards.  Be sure to tune in Monday night!