And now, the last act of March Madness, only in April. Time for roll call.
UConn, the (so far) unstoppable. Average winning margin through four tournament games: 27.5 points. Should it end that way, it would reset the all-time record of 23.5 by UCLA of 1967. Never mind asking if anyone can beat the Huskies and stop the first repeat champion in 17 years. Can anyone make them at least squirm a little?
Purdue, they delivered at last. At long, long, long last. After 44 years waiting to get back to the Final Four.
Alabama, the first timer. A commemorative gift for the Tide, please, since they just became the 100th different program to advance to a Final Four. See what happens when Nick Saban retires? Alabama becomes a basketball school.
And NC State, the sequel. Forty-one years after the Wolfpack clawed their way through the ACC tournament just to get a bid and then charged right onto the national championship — here's a new generation of survive-and-advance underdogs.
It is a diverse bunch headed for Arizona. The defending champion plus three contenders who haven't been this far in at least four decades, if at all. One team from the Big East, one from the Big Ten, one from the SEC, one from the ACC.
They will all take their unique storylines and goals to the desert.
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There is UConn's staggering dominance.
The Huskies have trailed 28 seconds the entire 2024 NCAA tournament, by two points to San Diego State. They have won 10 consecutive tournament games by double-digits going back to last season’s run, and during that streak have trailed only once in the second half — by two points for 17 seconds against Iona.
They were 3-for-17 in three-point shooting against Illinois and still went on a 30-0 run against the Big Ten tournament champion. They were 3-for-22 from beyond the arc against Northwestern and still led by as many as 30.
How to explain such carnage?
“Our defense is elite. Our offense is elite. We rebound the ball. These guys play every possession like it's the end of the world. We've got NBA-level players who are just willing to share and have created an unbelievable culture. We're going to be tough to beat,” coach Dan Hurley said.
Wait, there’s more.
“We have winners. We have "we" guys. We have also talked about legacy. You're talking Tristen Newton right now, you can make a case for the greatest career that any guard has ever had while wearing a uniform at UConn while he's at UConn. What he's accomplished in two years. Donovan Clingan. These guys right now are leaving a legacy in a place that's hard to leave a legacy. It's been a historical season in a tough place to make history. They're galvanized by that. It's special.“
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There is Purdue’s quest to be a Virginia copycat.
Five years ago, the Cavaliers went from the infamy of the first No. 1 seed victim of a No. 16 to the national championship in 12 months. Purdue was the second No. 1 seed victim last March. The Boilermakers are two wins away from matching Virginia's stunning atonement.
It took resolve for them to come back from last March. Also some self-evaluation of the program.
“You can learn from a lot of other people, but you'd damn sure better learn from our own mistakes, and that's what we've been able to do,” coach Matt Painter said. He went through his thought process, post-Fairleigh Dickinson: “We won the Big Ten by three games, we were the No. 1 seed. To take on that loss and be able to do that, you still got to look back and say, we did have some success there. We don't need to change everything. But we do need to make some subtle changes.
“I thought we had to be more skilled. By doing that, not everybody gets to play as much or even play at all, and that's difficult because they've meant a lot to our program, and they've done a lot of really good things. That's the part I hate about coaching because I want it to work. I want everybody on our team to have his role. I want everybody to be a starter. I want everybody to play and do that. So it's probably not a great quality to have as a coach. It's a good one to have as a person because it eats at me when like we've got guys that don't get in the game. It eats at me when they don't play. They probably don't feel that I feel that way, but I do. I just believe in the personnel that we had, and I felt we were going to make some improvements, but I didn't feel like what we were doing was wrong.”
Plus, they still had Zach Edey. Look where it’s all led. Not only the first Final Four since 1980 but a season that now includes an 11-0 record against ranked opponents.
One of the problems for anyone facing Purdue: How to defend Edey and his teammates without getting doomed by a Boilermaker parade to the free throw line? Ask Tennessee. The Vols met the Boilermakers twice this season and played them to four and six points. They could have gone either way, including Sunday. Tennessee shot 41 free throws in those two games. Purdue shot 81. Edey shot 39, two fewer than the entire Vols team. How to compete with that?
“It’s hard,” Tennessee coach Rick Barnes said. “He's a difficult guy to guard against, but he's a difficult guy for referees to officiate too. I don't care what anybody says. He's a hard guy to do that with because he's a unique guy in terms of how he plays."
There is Alabama’s firepower.
The Tide have hit 109 points once and 89 twice in the tournament and lead the nation in scoring at 90.6 a game. Only two scoring champions have ever won the national championship — Villanova in 2018 and North Carolina in 2005 — but that statistical warning didn't slow down Alabama In the West regional title game; Clemson shot 55.6 percent with only two turnovers in the second half, and lost. That’s because the Tide shot 69 percent and 66.7 percent in three-pointers. Remember how Duke upset Houston 54-51 the other night? Alabama edged Clemson 54-50 — in the second half.
Often it’s Mark Sears, averaging 24 points in the tournament and having 25 games this season of 20 or more, setting a school record that had stood for 45 years. This from a guy who started his career in the MAC at Ohio. And if not him, somebody else. In three of four NCAA tournament games, Grant Nelson has scored a total of 14 points. But he put up 24 against North Carolina and became the first player in 16 years to produce at least 20 points, 10 rebounds and five blocked shots in an NCAA tournament game. Freshman Jarin Stevenson had not scored in double figures since January and had combined for 50 points in his 13 previous games. But he went for 19 against Clemson, including going 6-for-7 on three-pointers the second half.
So, lots of people have had hands in Alabama’s first Final Four. Even a certain former football coach, when coach Nate Oats was worried about his defense. The Tide scored 81 points in a game seven times this season — including 95 against Kentucky, 88 and 87 against Florida and 86 against Purdue — and lost.
“I called Coach Saban. What have we got to do?” Oats said. “And he kind of gave me the "next" idea — next, next, next. So guys bought in. We can make this run. Other teams have done it. We have the capability to do it. We've got to get back to playing great defense — or start playing great defense; I don't know if "back" is the correct word. But we can have the No. 1 offense in the country; we had it for the majority of the year. Let's put a top-20 defense together and we can make a Final Four. And I think we did that.”
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And there is NC State’s mojo.
Three weeks ago, the Wolfpack were 17-14. They had lost seven of their previous nine games. Now they’re in the Final Four, and if they pick off two more favorites, they’ll be the national champions with the most defeats, ever. They beat five past national champions in five days to win the ACC tournament. They just beat two in three days in the South Regional. A No. 11 seed, they’re now the seventh double-digit seed to ever play in a Final Four.
NC State has acquired an aura in its advance. Underdogs that do this always do. The Wolfpack were down at halftime to Duke, then scored 55 points in the second half to win going away 76-64. DJ Burns Jr. had four points Friday against Marquette. He had 29 Sunday against the Blue Devils. In upsets of Marquette and Duke, the NC State defense limited the Golden Eagles and Blue Devils to 32.8 percent shooting, and 9-for-51 from the three-point arc.
“It gets to a point when you are winning games and like the way we are, where you expect to win, and I think our guys now are expecting to win. It's beautiful to watch,” coach Kevin Keatts said. “Our defense has been tremendous down the stretch. It's been so great.
“It's a miracle run, but we're not surprised. We don't come into this tournament saying, hey, let's just try to be here. We came (to the regional) to win it, and we did. Now we have to move on to our next stage.
So who’s going to be the one to tell the Wolfpack they can’t do it Glendale?
Or tell UConn no way it can steamroll a Final Four?
Or tell Purdue’s Zach Edey big centers make rims rattle but don’t win national championships?
Or tell Alabama no Final Four rookie is going to come in and own the place?
These teams of varied pedigrees and method have one thing in common. They haven’t taken no for an answer. That’s why they’re playing in April.
