Florida’s Walter Clayton Jr. got here up with the right going-away current for that spirit-crushing Houston protection that bullied, battered and bedeviled him all night time.
It was a defensive gem of his personal. Proper earlier than the buzzer. For the win and the nationwide title.
The Gators and Clayton by some means overcame Houston’s lockdown depth, together with a 12-point deficit Monday night time to will out a 65-63 victory in an NCAA title-game thriller determined when the Florida senior’s personal D stopped the Cougars from even taking a game-winning shot on the buzzer.
Clayton completed with 11 factors, all within the second half. What he’ll be remembered for many was getting Houston’s Emanuel Sharp to cease in the course of his movement as he tried to go up for the game-winning 3 within the closing seconds.
“Simply go one hundred pc,” Clayton stated when requested what he was making an attempt to do on the end. “We had been simply making an attempt to get a cease, and we occurred to get it. I’m joyful we received it carried out.”
With Sharp in search of room, Clayton ran at him. The Houston guard dropped the ball and, unable to select it up lest he get known as for touring, watched it bounce.
Alex Condon dived on the ball, then flipped it to Clayton, who ran to the other free-throw line with the buzzer sounding and tugged his jersey out of his shorts. Subsequent, the court docket was awash in Gator chomps and orange and blue confetti.
“We guarded them laborious after which I noticed the ball unfastened and I simply hoped we beat them to the ball,” Florida coach Todd Golden stated.
This marked the fourth comeback in six March Insanity wins for the Gators (36-4). They led this sport for a complete of 64 seconds, together with the final 46 ticks of a contest that was in limbo till the ultimate shot that by no means got here.
Houston coach Kelvin Sampson known as it “incomprehensible” that the Cougars couldn’t get a shot off on both of their final two possessions.
Concerning the final one, Sampson stated: “Clayton made a fantastic play. However that’s why you’ve received to shot faux and get into the paint. Two’s high quality.”
Will Richard had 18 factors to maintain the Gators in it, they usually gained their third general title and first since Billy Donovan went back-to-back in 2006-07.
This time, it’s Golden, in his third 12 months, bringing the title again to Gainesville, the place the Gator trustworthy can rejoice a win on one among school sports activities’ grandest phases for the primary time since Tim Tebow was enjoying quarterback for the soccer crew in 2008.
This was the primary hoops title for the Southeastern Convention since Kentucky in 2012, and the end result the ability convention hoped for (anticipating?) after putting a document 14 groups within the match.
The Cougars (35-5) and Sampson had been denied their first championship, and ended up in the identical spot because the colourful Phi Slama Jama groups from the Nineteen Eighties — oh-so-close in second place.
This was a defensive brawl — the Gators did not crack 70 for less than the second time all season — and for a lot of the night time, Clayton received the worst of it.
He was 0 for 4 from the sector with out a level via the primary half. Met on the prime of the circle, then double-teamed and trapped when vital, he didn’t rating till hitting two free throws with 14:57 left.
The participant who scored a minimum of 30 factors within the final two video games, who averaged 24.6 via the primary 5 video games of the match, who virtually singlehandedly outscored UConn and Texas Tech down the stretch of these March Insanity comebacks, completed with one 3-pointer. Earlier than that, he had a pair of three-point performs off drives to the ring that saved the Gators in putting vary. He completed 3 for 10.
He additionally grew to become a part of not one, however two stops that put these Gators within the historical past guide, and probably cemented himself as the most effective basketball participant to put on the orange and blue.
After Alijah Martin made two free throws to place Florida forward 64-63 — its first lead since 8-6 — the Gators lured Sharp right into a triple-team within the nook, the place Clayton pressured him, after which Richard received him to dribble the ball off his leg and out of bounds.
Florida made one free throw on the following possession and that arrange the finale.
The ball first went to L.J. Cryer, who led the Cougars with 19 factors. Blanketed by Richard, he threw to Sharp, who was transferring to identify up for a 3 when Clayton ran at him. That left him with no alternative however to let the ball go.
“It was a fantastic defensive play by Walter,” Condon stated. “I simply dived on it, and listening to the buzzer go was a loopy feeling.”
As an alternative of the 69-year-old Sampson turning into the oldest coach to win the title, the 39-year-old Golden turns into the youngest since N.C. State’s Jim Valvano in 1983 to win all of it.
This gut-wrenching loss got here two nights after the Cougars usual a wild comeback of their very own, from 14 down towards Duke.
All three Ultimate 4 video games had been determined down the stretch, none by greater than Florida’s six-point win over Auburn on Saturday. Any thought that the boys’s sport had been overtaken by the more and more standard girls will in all probability go on maintain a minimum of for a 12 months.
The three girls’s Ultimate 4 video games, capped by UConn’s blowout of South Carolina on Sunday, had been determined by a mean of 24.7 factors.
“When it will get right down to the 2 greatest groups left,” Sampson stated of the thriller he barely misplaced, “it’s not going to be simple for both crew.”
