McCollum's Column: And why didn’t that halfcourt shot go in?
By all rights of dreams and fantasy, the shot should have gone in.
Everything seemed to be magically set up for a finish to end all NCAA finishes. Butler, the No. 5 seed playing just six miles away from a birthplace of Cinderella hoop dreams, had the last shot and it was attempted from halfcourt just before the buzzer by the Bulldogs’ best player, Gordon Hayward. From the television angle, it look awfully good for awhile, until in glanced off the backboard and the right side of the rim, millimeters away from glory.
The shot should have gone in because Jimmy Chitwood’s last-second basket did in the movie “Hoosiers,” the story of the 1954 Indiana high school basketball championship in which Milan High School (emblematic of every little school in the country), upset the big boys from Muncie. This was supposed to be “Hoosiers, The Sequel.” — with 21st Century glitz. Butler has one of the smallest enrollments of any team playing Division I basketball and seemed the appropriate poster child for the “little guys in the shadows.”
And this title game was better than the one in the movies. Back and forth. Ebb and flow. Big plays, tough plays, bad plays, astounding plays.
It was all set for the reprise of the “Milan Moment.”
But this “Milan moment” was a rim shot.
Duke, whose basketball team many love to hate and was the perfect villain for this story, came away with both the NCAA trophy, pieces of the net and Cinderella’s slipper.
The Devils are good at slapping Cinderella. And this year, they had to fight off a continuing cast of Cinderellas of many shapes and sizes: Arkansas-Pine Bluff, California, Purdue, Baylor, West Virginia, culminating with going against the team almost everyone learned to love this season, Butler.
The Bulldogs played good basketball, exhibiting the kind of teamwork we all like to see with the background touches. Their coach (Brad Stevens) left a promising job in the private sector to get into coaching. He graduated from DePauw, a NCAA Division III institution in Hendrix’s conference. Butler’s players even went to class on the morning of the title game. Of course, it’s nice when the arena for the title game is just six miles away from campus. The irony is that in losing, Butler may have never been more triumphant.
Duke has taken its beatings from Cinderella in recent years. As far as individual, one-on-one talent, this year’s team was, on paper, the weakest it has sent to a championship. Some thought the Blue Devils were the most questionable of the tournament’s No. 1 seeds and the most likely to be upset.
But the Blue Devils, with underrated talent, had enormous synergy and immeasurable grit and heart. They were a tough out. They had more physical power than most Duke teams and they did what they had to do against an assortment of challenges as the tournament played out.
Still, you thought Butler might be the team to do it. The Bulldogs play their games in Hinkle Fieldhouse, the very arena where the Milan miracle happened.
The Blue Devils also have a knack for ripping apart Hollywood-type scripts. Duke coach Mike Kryszewski is skillful at preparing players to destroy wish lists.
Nevertheless, it was one heck of a championship game, one that featured championship basketball from start to finish, teams trading big play for big play and momentum switch for momentum switch. A five-point lead, which was hard to come by, seemed like 10.
Few championship games are that good from opening tip to the last shot.
So, the NCAA has pretty much the ideal tournament: Great first-round games, unbelievable upsets, a interesting collection of Cinderellas, buzzer-beaters, astounding individual efforts, bracket-busters galore, an improbable Final Four, a No. 11 seed playing in its hometown against a No. 1 seed for the national title and the only No. 1 seed to survive winning it by the tiniest of margins.
This year’s tournament was probably as good as it gets in both strength of games and dramatics.
And now, NCAA officials are probably going to expand the tournament up to 96 teams.
Oh, they’ll be some good games — but more good games involving average teams, some that enter the tournament limping rather than surging. Many players involved in the tournament will miss at least two full weeks of classes. The probability of missing class and exams is one major stated reason NCAA officials are against a playoff in the Football Championship Subdivision. It’s apparently a non-issue in major college basketball, the No. 1 revenue-producer in collegiate sports.
Under the expanded format, North Carolina would have made the field with a 5-12 conference record.
With a diluted field, you’re likely to see fewer amazing first-round upsets. The opening rounds of the NCAA tournament, now perhaps the most exciting single days is sports, would likely be reduced to just another busy day of basketball.
It’s like extending a thrilling roller coaster to reduce the incline and speed. There will be a rush — but it won’t be the same.
So, remember this tournament, from that first day in which most of us tore apart our brackets to that buzzer-beating halfcourt shot that almost put a crown on Cinderella.
From beginning to end, we may never see anything like it anytime soon.
(Sports columnist David McCollum can be reached at 505-1235 or david.mccollum@thecabin.net)
