Mario & the Miracle!
Posted by Chris
That's the headline from the Lawrence Journal-World newspaper after my Kansas Jayhawks pulled out will go down in history as one of the greatest championship games of all time!I'm a day late in commenting as we traveled to the Masters yesterday in Augusta to take in a practice round (more on that later, including pictures).
I've gotten comments, text messages, Facebook wall posts & more over the last 36 hours since we won. It was incredible! When Mario Chalmers hit the 3 to send it into OT our family went crazy! Andrea's entire family was in town - from Texas, Oklahoma, Kentucky & New York - and all were pulling for the Jayhawks. When that shot hit it was an amazing experience!
We spent much of the travel time yesterday listening in to sports talk radio talk about the game. After the trip there & back I honestly got tired of hearing the coverage, mostly because all of it surround how Memphis 'blew it' - forget about the incredible play of the Jayhawks down the stretch. Which leads me to my own commentary...
The Jayhawks won the game for two simple reasons...
1. Kansas outcoached Memphis
The fact is that Calipari made the wrong choices down the line. No question. The fact also, though, is that Bill Self incredibly kept his team in it. I still don't know how he was able to keep those guys believing that they had a chance. I didn't think they had a chance when they were down by 9 with 2:12 left. He did it, though.
2. Kansas outplayed Memphis
Memphis missed free throws. They had second chance opportunities with rebounds, but didn't take advantage of them. Granted. Let's not forget, though, that Kansas made free throws; that they made incredible plays (even beyond Mario's 3) down the stretch.
So - Memphis is going to have to live with 'blowing it' - but let's not take the spotlight away from the incredible finish that Kansas was able to put together to take advantage of every opportunity they had (and to create opportunities when they weren't even there).
Rock, Chalk, Jayhawk!
Comments