Engineering the biggest upset in NCAA men’s tournament history requires close to perfection. It’s an impossible standard to set over the course of a 40-minute basketball game, but the one Siena largely stared down as it looked No. 1 overall seed Duke in the eye.
For much of that Thursday afternoon in Greenville, S.C., the Saints were exactly that. Every big three dropped. The defensive plan to slow likely national player of the year Cameron Boozer was working. Confidence grew in the green and gold and wavered for 32–2 Duke. Siena made it to halftime with a double-digit lead and didn’t get immediately popped out of the locker room by a Duke team that admitted coming out of the locker room that it thought the Saints would be a “cakewalk” coming into the day.
