Games I watched:
(8) North Carolina 81-77 (2) Duke
Ohhhhhhhhh! What a pleasure to watch! Hell, yeah, I even left my house and went to the local Regal Beagle because I had to see this one. I'm a total sports nerd, watch sports of some kind just about every day, but it's been a while since I've felt this level of anticipation for a game. And the Tarheels did not let me down. I come not to praise Coach K but to bury him. (*) I would've preferred watching him lose to Kentucky, but, hey, a 2-game losing streak to UNC when he's got a team of 5 lottery picks was schadenfreude enough for me. As for this game, it was tight all the way through, Duke had moments when it looked like they might pull away but that never lasted long. UNC had a nice run right at the beginning of the 2nd half and though they weren't able to build a lead and hold it, it was enough to sustain them down to the final minute. And in the end, well, UNC got hot and Duke went cold. So long, Coach K, glad to see ya go (**).
Other results:
(2) Villanova 65-81 (1) Kansas
Kansas scored the first 10 points and that was pretty much it, they carried a double digit lead for most of the rest of the game. When Villanova almost kinda came close to making a run, KU shut 'em down and closed it out. This Kansas team is strange: there is nothing dominant about them at all, this is not one of the more talented Jayhawk squads and there's cloud hanging over them (re: they're not likely to be allowed into next year's tourney). But they play good team defense and shoot well and they persevere, which has carried them all the way to the Final where they are the favorite (and were my pick to win it all). Nova made a good run, but this was not a classic Nova team by any means, either. Weird year in college b-ball, kinda makes sense that the semifinal was blue bloods, I reckon.
The Final:
(8) North Carolina 69-72 (1) Kansas
Kinda bittersweet as a Kentucky fan: the Wildcats whomped the shit out of both of these teams this year, but they're here and the Wildcats aren't. To be fair: UNC is a totally different team now and KU just had a bad shooting night. (Oh, and on the Ladies' side, dominant champion South Carolina suffered only two losses all year long, the last one being to Kentucky...damn, so close and yet neither the boys nor the girls went deep this year)
Despite a 15 point lead at the half, the Tarheels could not keep the momentum going and the Jayhawks steadily pounded away and finished it off even after some dubious play down the stretch. Hey, I picked 'em to win so I can't be shocked that Kansas finished the tourney strong, but I still think this is one of the weirder champions after one of the weirder seasons that I can remember.
(*) Blogspot wouldn't let me publish this post initially. Yes, I expressed my lifelong disdain for Duke but I wasn't in any way advocating any harm to anything Duke-related. But, well, I did perhaps go a little far in expressing a similar disdain for Bobby Knight and, yes, well, there was an anecdote that was probably worthy of being excised (all the darlings come and go). So, a coupla days later, I gotta say kudos to you, Blogspot. You were (probably) right and I was (probably) wrong but hey, man, college sports just brings it out of me in ways that the rest of planet Earth does not. Thank you, Blogspot, for curbing my weaker tendencies.
(**) Here's how I will always remember Coach K and his dukies.
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