Man, how lucky are we? Sure, the NCAA Tournament didn’t produce a ton of wild times in the first two weekends, but it was all worth it for the frenzy of Saturday.
For me at least, a day that will live in college hoops infamy. Hopefully, Monday provides an appropriate capper, but Saturday’s action was plenty enough in the drama department. In the final College Basketball Weekly post of the season before the actual season ends, let’s break down a historic collapse, an amazing statement by Houston, and the fun that is Florida’s backcourt.
Admittedly, Houston played like toilet water for most of Saturday’s Final Four game; the game felt out of hand before it was even competitive. Duke stiff-armed Houston from the jump and kept those whirling wingspans away for much of the contest. I mean, the Cougars very clearly had no idea what they were doing on at least half a dozen offensive possessions in the first half. Duke forced them into one bad look after another, and Houston’s only salvation was their occasional fireballs from beyond the 3-point line.
But every time they needed that injection of points, Emmanuel Sharp or LJ Cryer provided.
With 8:00 to play in the first half and Houston down 18-10 amid a five-minute field goal drought — bang, Emmanuel Sharp from just inside the logo for 3 to keep them involved. Duke got the advantage to 31-19 with 1:45 to go in the half and the game certainly in the balance, and Houston responded with 3s on three straight possessions, two by LJ Cryer and one by Sharp, to trim the deficit down to 6 at the half, a minor miracle.
Of course, Duke jumped out again in the second half, surging ahead 58-45 thanks to a Cooper Flagg layup with just over 10 minutes to play. That would be Duke’s second-to-last field goal of the game, because from that moment to the final horn, Houston dragged Duke to the mud and swamped ’em.
The lead got to 59-45 when LJ Cryer came through with a lean-in 3, followed by a Cryer floater to cut the lead back down to eight in a jiffy. A few moments later, Emmanuel Sharp got loose for a layup to make it 59-55 (a Houston Kill Shot, cc Evan Miya) and the panic was on. Duke did get a key 3 from Cooper Flagg to push it back out to nine, but Houston just kept rumbling back with points of their own.
Finally, a boneheaded technical foul on an inbounds pass by JoJo Tugler seemed to put the game away, allowing Duke a free throw which put the lead to 67-61 while the Blue Devils retained possession with 1:14 to play. However, here’s where Houston won the game:
Instead of fouling automatically to initiate a 74-second parade to the free throw line, the Cougars actually played the game out. You know, it’s a great strategy for the best defensive team in the country, a team that forces turnovers as often as anyone.
They walled up on the next Duke possession before the ultimate Tugler redemption. He blocked Kon Kneuppel’s shot at the rim and Houston stormed down to find Emmanuel Sharp for a pristine look from 3, which he of course nailed with 32 seconds to play. And again, Houston did NOT foul immediately, instead making the best bet in college sports, that a team full of teenagers would likely cough the basketball up in the biggest moment of their careers. Of course, they did.
Mylik Wilson tipped the inbounds pass away from Cooper Flagg, then JoJo Tugler batted it up in the air and Emmanuel Sharp came down with the ball. Stop right there. I’ve seen that play 1,000 times before under Kelvin Sampson’s Houston. This is their DNA. Arms everywhere and total chaos in the final minute, and no college basketball program has ever thrived in the chaos, in the fire, like these Houston Cougars. They just needed to drag Duke to the mud, and they’d win a pig fight.
Houston actually missed after that turnover, but JoJo Tugler was right there to slam home the rebound. 67-66, one possession remaining. Now, it’s time to foul, and Houston wisely tagged Tyrese Proctor, an oddly weak free throw shooter for a point guard. He missed the front end of the 1-and-1, a brutal foul call on Flagg ensued, setting up a 62% free throw shooter in J’Wan Roberts to decide the ball game. Unlike his opponent, Roberts nailed both, and that was your game right there folks.
Forget the ugliness of Houston’s first 30 minutes and the opposing beauty of Duke’s. The basketball game came down to basically three plays: Houston’s forced turnover and putback dunk, Proctor’s missed free throw, and then Roberts’ successful tries. Houston executed where Duke didn’t.
This Houston team can send reverberations throughout the sport if they go on to win the whole thing. Juxtapose their culture and makeup with the upside-down landscape of college athletics right now. Coaches, media and fans love to complain about the transfer portal and NIL. Well, here’s a team whose eight-man rotation features 22 collective years of experience at the University of Houston, led by a coach who was fired from Indiana.
There is no one star. Houston’s superpower isn’t an 18-year-old, it’s 22 years worth of grit, toughness and killer instinct. They will not be out-fought, they haven’t been, and that’s the most noble trait in the world. Houston for the title, y’all, it feels like a movement.
There’s no way to sugarcoat it: Duke just suffered one of the worst losses in the entire history of their program. Presumptive favorites to cruise to the national title, even against an all-1-seed Final Four, the Blue Devils continued to look like the bully against Houston, executing at an NBA level for 32 minutes against an outmatched group of scrappy college kids. But in the final eight minutes, Kelvin Sampson dragged Jon Scheyer into the mud, and his Blue Devils have never been able to win a street fight.
Scheyer proved himself an exceptional coach (just so that’s clear). But two years ago, after a second-round NCAA Tournament loss vs. Tennessee, Volunteer players and coaches commented that they took Duke into the mud… and Duke wanted no part of the mess. Of course, Duke responded with an Elite Eight run in 2024, beating an under-manned Houston squad in the Sweet 16 to face the David to their Goliath on Tobacco Road — NC State, who punched Duke in the mouth and pulled the stunning upset to steal away the Final Four spot.
In 2025, Duke was an aggressor all year, beating Auburn early on to establish themselves as a force of power, and they were certainly that. Just look at the size on Duke’s guys, the talent with (at least) three first-round NBA Draft picks, a historic KenPom offense and analytical profile, plus that defense we talked about vs. Alabama which also forced Houston into horrendous shot selection for a whole half. This group had it all.
Yet, the blown lead is only fitting given the background of this team and the Scheyer era. Finally, let’s call it how it is: the ACC stunk out loud! Duke played in one competitive game in the final two months of the regular season… and they lost to Clemson, much the same way they lost their only other games to Kentucky and Kansas.
Those were essentially the three closest games Duke played in, and in all three, the Blue Devils simply did not execute down the stretch. Guys, the alleged best offense in KenPom history scored one field goal in the final 10 minutes of the basketball game. And we have to point out Cooper Flagg, who had the ball in his hands to end each of those contests and came up empty every time, missing a solid mid-range look to end Saturday’s contest as well.
It’s tough. Houston’s guys have years of tight games and wild finishes under their belts, while this Duke team simply never learned how to battle adversity, because they so rarely faced it. I don’t know, maybe a true point guard would have helped.
The best conference wire to wire, the SEC provided one last clash of its titans in the national semifinal, and boy did it deliver. You know the beats with Florida at this point. Auburn got ahead, leaned on Johni Broome in the first half while Florida made the long bet the Tigers couldn’t win off of Broome post-ups alone, and then the Gators and that magic wonder child in their backcourt gave 20 million television viewers yet another spectacle.
Auburn’s lead crested at 49-40 with 18 minutes left when Will Richard sparked the vital Florida run, beating four Auburn players to an offensive rebound, then bruising his way to an and-one layup. He then grabbed another great board on the ensuing defensive possession over seven-foot Auburn senior Dylan Cardwell, flipping the ball to Walter Clayton, who found space for his patented off-the-bounce 3, changing the entire complexity of the game at 49-46 now. The next possessions after that… Florida tied it up with an Alijah Martin 3 and usurped the lead with a Clayton layup. From there, all momentum followed the orange and blue.
We talked about Houston’s superpower, but Florida’s is more recognizable: their guards rock, it’s that simple. Walter Clayton has already surpassed Kemba Walker’s legendary performance and he’s that Carsen Edwards type of postseason firework. He caught Aladin’s genie in a bottle and wished for a month full of made jump shots.
Even after taking the lead, Florida needed more Clayton craziness, and he delivered after Auburn’s brief run to hit a wicked side-step 3 with Chad Baker-Mazara’s hand painted onto his face, just an absurd little stick from the corner. Whether it was transition layups, off-balance runners or his increasingly creative 3-point tries, Walter Clayton just came to the rescue every time the Gators felt a little out of balance.
Heck, bigs like Alex Condon and Micah Handlogten provided zilch all day long against arguably the best frontcourt in the country after dominating the Tigers back in February, and it didn’t matter because Clayton and that perimeter trio carried them home. In the final fourth of the ballgame, Martin provided raucous dunks and Clayton worked off the dribble to keep Auburn barely out of reach.
Man, how lucky are we? Sure, the NCAA Tournament didn’t produce a ton of wild times in the first two weekends, but it was all worth it for the frenzy of Saturday. For me at least, a day that will live in college hoops infamy. Hopefully Monday provides an appropriate capper.
