The Wildcats, who dramatically beat North Carolina Monday night in the NCAA championship game on Kris Jenkins’ last-second 3-pointer, will parade through Center City Friday afternoon. More importantly was the manner in which ‘Nova did it: with a buzzer-beating three from Kris Jenkins that negated a bonkers long-distance bomb from Carolina’s Marcus Paige just seconds before.
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Whittenburg also said Jenkins’ game winning-shot stirred up memories of Charles, the burly forward who died in 2011 at age 47 when a bus he was driving crashed.
“Do you know how many times I’ve seen that kid take that shot in the summer?”
And the biggest one of all headed straight to the UNC locker room to offer his support immediately following Carolina’s crushing, last-second defeat to Villanova.
The viewing party in Villanova’s home stadium, The Pavilion, erupted after the final buzzer.
Sophomore guard Phil Booth led the Wildcats in scoring, posting 20 points off the bench, including going a ideal 2-for-2 from behind the arc. Compared with the 2014 final between Kentucky and CT (12.9), though, last night’s game was off a more modest 7%.
“I have no idea what I said at the end”, Nantz said with a smile after the game.
Wright says he wanted Britt more than he wanted Jenkins when he started recruiting the brothers from the Baltimore area.
“I told my team when I made that shot, we go to overtime”, Paige said.
Although its tough to top Jenkins’ stellar game-winning moment, Villanova coach Jay Wright might have done so.
They played the role of serial underdogs in the NCAA Tournament, the selection committee refusing them the two things – a No. 1 seed and/or the chance to play in the Philadelphia regional – they most coveted. “It’s going to remind me of how close we were”. Logan Warmoth drove in the first run of the night, followed by a Brandon Riley RBI double to pull UNC within one.
But far too often great finishes are the easiest way to make us forget just how awful a game truly was. Making one of the biggest shots in college basketball history was easy by comparison.
“He just let me know how proud he was and how happy he was for me”, Jenkins said.
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North Carolina got within 3 after a pair of free throws by Kennedy Meeks with about seven minutes left, but Ryan Arcidiacono scored the first five points of a 7-0 spurt that made it 67-57 with 5 1/2 left. They’re not going to care about the fact that tickets were cheap or that the ratings were down or that the teams participating in the event weren’t as good as we’ve come to expect. But both endings were great, both games were great in their own respect.
