So, with many among the 69,423 folks packed inside of Caesars Superdome Monday night in New Orleans afraid to exhale during the final seconds, you just knew it had to end this way.
And “it” referred to everything.
March Madness
The American Gaming Association said the NCAA men’s basketball tournament produced around 45 million citizens planning to wager three times more money this year during its four weeks ($3.1 billion) than the Super Bowl. Speaking of madness and March or any other month involving 2022 college hoops, did Saint Peter’s really make the Elite Eight as opposed to anybody y0u’ve heard of?
The Final Four
This time, it featured two championship games since North Carolina’s thriller over Duke on Saturday night felt like one during Mike Krzyzewski’s farewell to coaching in the semifinals. If you believe what sports memorabilia expert Ken Goldin told Sportico, North Carolina keeping Coach K from a sixth national title ended the chance for somebody to pocket $500,000 by selling the game-used basketball in the title game to the highest bidder.
The actual championship game
You had No. 1 seed Kansas exploding at the start, and then you had No. 8 seed North Carolina surging ahead by 16 points before settling for a 40-25 lead at halftime. After that, you had Kansas threatening to blow past a North Carolina bunch looking as ghastly during much of the second half as those dead gators on the side of Louisiana highways. Finally, you had North Carolina (somehow) clawing back before you had Kansas clinging to a 72-69 lead along the way to running the clock out with ease for their first national title in 14 years.
Well, um.
That was until Kansas guard DaJuan Harris Jr., stepped out of bounds with 4.3 seconds left.
Suddenly, as the inhaling got deeper throughout Orleans Parish, North Carolina had a chance to force overtime by connecting on a 3-point shot, and why wouldn’t the game become this insane?
See “it” above.
“Oh, man. When (Harris) stepped out of bounds, we thought we kind of had the game won at that point,” Kansas guard Ochai Agbaji told me on the court later with confetti flying everywhere. He was named the 2022 NCAA Tournament Most Outstanding Player, even though he struggled for stretches against North Carolina (4-for-9 from the floor, 3-for-8 at the foul line for 12 points).
But Agbaji wasn’t the guy who caused more inhaling everywhere by committing a nearly costly turnover for Kansas in those final seconds.
“It was kind of a little eerie feeling after that,” Agbaji said. “Obviously, if they could hit a shot, and I’m thinking — and we’re all thinking — we don’t want them to shoot a three, so we just have to play up.”
North Carolina did shoot a three, and it was from Caleb Love, the most clutch scorer for the Tar Heels during the tournament.
This wasn’t the same Caleb Love, though.
Like most of his North Carolina teammates, Love dribbled through the second half as if it was all catching up to him. This particular “it”ranged from the Tar Heels sprinting into March Madness after they limped away from early-season losses to Purdue, Tennessee, Kentucky and Miami to ruining two sets of goodbyes for Krzyzewski — his home farewell at the end of the regular season and the one in the unofficial championship game of the Final Four.
Soon after intermission, I could tell from my media seat near court side that North Carolina was emotionally drained. Love became the poster player for it all, with his long jumpers falling short, and with a slew of missed attempts at the rim. He made just five of his 29 shots overall, so it wasn’t surprising that the jumper he launched at the end from behind the arc barely touched the front of the rim before the ball fell harmlessly away.
Love cried afterward. So did other Tar Heels after they blew the biggest lead in the history of NCAA men’s basketball title games.
That said, Kansas’ 72-69 victory, which gave Bill Self two national championships as Jayhawks head coach, was more about 6-foot-10 David McCormack (15 points, 10 rebounds, one blocked shot, one steal) playing well throughout. He had a couple of huge buckets down the stretch. Jalen Wilson added 15 more points for the Jayhawks, and they also got splendid moments from Christian Braun (12 points and 12 rebounds) and Remy Martin, with four 3-pointers among his 14 points off the bench.
All of that almost didn’t matter for Kansas.
Then it did.
The buzzer sounded after Love’s missed shot ended the March-turned-April drama in the 2022 NCAA men’s basketball tournament.
We all exhaled after that.
