Matt Bush, FISM News
In a tournament marked with historic upsets, the teams that will participate in this year’s Final Four might be the “bluest” of all time. Four blue blood programs whose colors are all, well…blue, are headed to New Orleans to fight for a spot in the national championship.
In the Elite 8 games this weekend, UNC dominated Cinderella school St. Peter’s, Duke avoided trouble against Arkansas, Kansas defeated Miami, and Villanova outlasted Houston to each punch their ticket to the next round. What is left are four of the historically best basketball programs in the nation facing off for the championship.
On Sunday, for the first time in this year’s tournament, St. Peter’s looked like a 15-seed. The Peacocks could not match up with UNC’s size, handle UNC’s quickness, or keep up with UNC’s talent. UNC did what everyone thought Kentucky was going to do in the first round, as they dominated the much smaller school from start to finish.
In a game that had everyone outside of Chapel Hill pulling for the underdog Peacocks, St. Peter’s was never really in it. UNC’s frontcourt of Bacot and Manek were just too much, and that combined with quality guard play turned the highly anticipated contest into a blowout. St. Peter’s run, though, was historic as they were the first 15-seed to make the Elite 8.
Even with the Peacock’s attention-grabbing run coming to an end, there are still several big storylines heading into the Final Four, two of them revolving around Duke coach Mike Krzyzewski and the Blue Devils.
After having surpassed 100 wins earlier in the tournament, Coach K reached another milestone with Duke’s win on Saturday. The win over the Razorbacks gave Krzyzewski the most coaching Final Four appearances ever with 13, surpassing legendary UCLA coach John Wooden. He is now looking to secure one more milestone before he retires, winning his sixth national championship.
Another unique storyline for this year’s Final Four is that it is the first time that UNC and Duke will have ever played in the NCAA tournament. The Duke-UNC men’s basketball rivalry is thought by many to be the greatest in all of college sports. These matchups have featured some of the best players, greatest games, and multiple no.1 versus no. 2 regular season matchups, but the two programs have never matched up on the game’s largest stage, until now.
There is another storyline that many people are overlooking due to the attention on Coach K’s final season and the fact that UNC doesn’t feel like much of an underdog, as this is their 21st trip to the Final Four .
In 1985, Rollie Massimino’s eighth-seeded Villanova Wildcats took on the top seeded Georgetown Hoyas in what many people considered the most lopsided finals matchup in NCAA history. Patrick Ewing and the Hoyas were expected to dominate and take home the championship heading into the game. In one of the greatest upsets in NCAA basketball history, the Wildcats upset the Hoyas, to become the lowest seed to ever win the tournament.
UNC now has a chance to tie that Villanova team as the lowest-seed to win the tournament.
Even after all of the upsets, the tournament is left with two 2-seeds, a 1-seed, and a highly underrated 8-seed that has the talent to win it all. The Villanova-Kansas game should be a great matchup pitting two great teams against each other with huge talent and a physical style of play that made them both two of the favorites before the tournament began. The Duke-UNC matchup has enough storylines, history, and drama to fill multiple books and will see even the most passive NCAA fans tuning in.
The two Final Four games will take place this Saturday, with the winners playing in the national championship game on Monday night.