Four games. Seven days. One crown.
A championship crown.
The Nebraska men’s basketball program beat the UCF Knights 77-66 on Sunday to win the inaugural College Basketball Crown inside T-Mobile Arena in Las Vegas.
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It was a game that featured Husker basketball history. Brice Williams, NU’s first-team All-Big Ten and all-everything player, broke James Palmer Jr.’s single-season scoring record (708) and ends his NU career with 713.
Williams entered the game 17 points shy of breaking the record and did so with a 21-point effort against the Knights. Williams was one of three Huskers who scored at least 20 points.
Connor Essegian poured in 21 points — 14 in the second half — while Juwan Gary was his usual junkyard dawg self with 20 points, eight rebounds and two steals.
Nebraska shot 48% from the field and 43% from 3-point range (9-of-21). NU’s defense limited UCF to 40% from the field and 24% from 3 (7-of-29).
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While it’s not the Big Dance, winning this tournament was still huge for the program, said NU assistant Ernie Zeigler.
“When you think back to the ups and downs of the season and what could have been in terms of being in the NCAA Tournament, but to finish this thing off, and these kids staying together throughout that, because they could have very easily said, hey, no mas, after we lost that last regular-season game to Iowa,” Zeigler told Huskers Radio Network as the confetti fell. “So that’s a testament to our guys. Obviously a huge testament to coach Hoiberg. …To see the fortitude of our guys, the focus that they had in preparing for each and every opponent, and to be out here now, looking down here and seeing guys cut those nets down, it’s just a huge, huge deal.”
NU looked like it was going to run away in the early parts of the game and even pushed its lead to 12 points, 23-11, with 10:21 left before halftime. There was a 14-2 NU run in there that included back-to-back 3s plus a jumper from Williams as well as a triple from Essegian.
But UCF fought back and was doing it without its best player in Darius Johnson, who was slowed with a hamstring injury and played just 11 minutes. Instead, it was 6-3 guard Jordan Ivy-Curry who came off the bench to match Williams’ first-half output with 15 points.
UCF ended the half strong and scored seven straight points to turn a 33-26 deficit into a 33-all ballgame. NU didn’t make a field goal in the final five minutes.
The offensive struggles continued to start the second half. At one point, NU missed 14 consecutive shots from the field, and UCF scored 16 straight points to grab a 14-point edge, 49-35, with 15 minutes remaining.
But then the Huskers woke up.
NU rattled off runs of 11 and 13 while going on a massive momentum-shifting 24-3 run to give it a 59-52 lead with seven minutes left. NU never trailed again.
During that 24-3 run, Essegian scored 11 points and sank three 3s while Gary, the junkyard dawg he is, sparked the comeback by providing toughness in the paint and scoring at the rim.
Gary even had to leave the game for a brief moment because he was bleeding after being elbowed in the head on a rebound. He returned to the court and didn’t miss a beat. Zeigler called it Gary’s “Willis Reed moment.”
“He came back in and was a huge catalyst in us cutting that lead down quickly and getting back in the game,” Zeigler said of Gary, who was named MVP.
UCF did get its deficit down to four points, but NU got strong play from Cale Jacobsen, who had answers with a 3 and a layup, which came over the top of UCF’s 7-foot-2 center Moustapha Thiam.
NU’s two walk-ons, Sam Hoiberg and Jacobsen, who found their way into the starting lineup during the Crown played their roles well once again. Hoiberg didn’t score but moved the ball and finished with seven assists and two steals. Jacobsen added five points, six rebounds, one steal and one block.
NU sealed the win at the free-throw line as Williams sank six freebies in the final 1:10. The Huskers shot just 59% at the line overall (10-17) but those 10 points were better than what UCF mustered at the line, as the Knights shot just six all game, making five.
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